Philip Kerr - Dark Matter

“Four,” said Newton. “You have a habit of forgetting George Macey.”

“I had not forgotten,” I said. “How could I when the manner of his death was so memorable? But at your own instruction I had put it out of my mind. Or at least one part of my mind. And yet for all its singularity, I sometimes think his death can hardly be associated with these others.”

Newton only grunted, and seeming much preoccupied with the poor Major’s death, he walked slowly back to the Mint office — not along Water Lane, which would have been more direct, but up Mint Street; for although he did not say, I knew that he wished to avoid a further confrontation with Lord Lucas — with me following at a distance respectful to his deep thoughts.

Upon reaching the Mint office I fetched us both a cup of cider — of which he was most fond — and I observed that Newton thought some more. He sat down in his favourite chair by the fire, and removing his wig, which was always a sign that he wished his brain to be most comfortable inside his head, he held his lace stock with both hands and twisted it like a garrotte, as if he meant to squeeze something useful out of his head.

For a while I believed he did recriminate himself some more, or that his thoughts were directed toward the cipher, for although he did not examine the letter he had taken from the Major, I knew his mind was capable of holding what was written there almost at a glance. But when, after more than an hour with the cat upon his lap, he spoke again, it was to utter one word.

“Remarkable,” he said.

“What is, sir?”

“Why, the murder of Major Mornay, of course.”

“With respect, Doctor, I have been sitting here considering how unremarkable it is. Compared with the others that went before.”

“What was it you said about George Macey?” he asked.

“Why, sir, nothing. I have been silent this past hour.”

“Back in the Comptroller’s garden, sir. What were you talking about?”

“Only that it seemed hard to believe that Macey’s murder had any connection with these three subsequent murders, sir.”

“Why do you say so?”

“Its very lack of any distinguishing features, sir.”

“But do you find many such features attending the murder of Major Mornay?” he asked.

“Well, sir, there is the coded letter. We first encountered the code with Kennedy, and then with Mercer.”

“Apart from that, what else?”

I thought for a moment. “I cannot think of anything,” I admitted.

“That is what is so remarkable about this latest murder,” said Newton. “Its singular lack of features. No dead ravens. No stones in the dead man’s mouth. No peacock feathers. No flute. Nothing except the body itself and this enciphered letter. It is as if the Tower’s murderer had become mute.”

“Indeed, sir. But perhaps our murderer has nothing to say to us. And but for the presence of another message in code, one might almost think Major Mornay was murdered by someone different from the man who killed Mercer and Kennedy. Or for that matter from the person who killed George Macey.”

Newton lapsed into another of his long silences, which were best answered with silence. And it was at times like these that I put aside the murders that were done in the Tower and, picking up a sampler in my mind, returned with silk thread and tent stitches to further embroider my love for Miss Catherine Barton. Which by now was quite a piece of work. And with my own thoughts thus diverted, I dreamed of being in her company again, for it was that night that I was due to sup with her uncle and his niece; so that I almost thought Newton had looked into my mind and seen what was done there when he said that it was time we went to Jermyn Street, to sup. My heart missed a beat and my ears burned so that I was glad I was wearing my wig and Newton could not see their colour and mock my embarrassment.

The coach journey to Jermyn Street was also conducted in silence, which made me think that for all his avowed hostility to the monastic order, Newton should have made a splendid monk, albeit one like his hero, Giordano Bruno. Bruno was executed as a heretic in 1600 because of his theories of the infinite universe, the multiplicity of worlds, and his adherence to Copernicanism. Newton greatly admired Bruno, who was strongly suspected of Arianism, and certainly the two had much in common, although I do not think they could ever have liked each other. Like Cain, genius cannot abide its own brother.

Nor is genius always as honest as it could be. I already knew how Newton had pretended a show of adherence to Trinitarianism at Cambridge in order to remain the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics. I was about to apprehend just how much Newton could also counterfeit a show of religious orthodoxy toward his niece, Miss Barton.

In truth she seemed more than pleased to see me accompanying her uncle, for I swear she blushed upon finding me standing in her parlour, and stammered out a greeting most tremulously, which made me feel very good inside, as if I had already quaffed a mug of the hot wine she swiftly prepared for us. She wore a lace commode upon her head, as was most fashionable, an amber necklace, and a silver lace Mantua gown which was open at the front to reveal an embroidered corset, and was most becoming to her.

After supper, Miss Barton sang to her own accompaniment on the spinette, which was as beautiful a sound as I had ever hoped to hear outside of heaven. She had a fine voice, not strong but very pure, although I think that Newton cared nothing for music, whatever its origin. At last he stood up, pulled the periwig from his head, which Miss Barton replaced with an elegant scarlet nightcap of her own embroidery, and bowed slightly in my direction.

“I have a mind to study our cipher,” he explained. “So I will say good night to you, Mister Ellis.”

“Then I must be leaving, too.”

“Shall you go?” asked Miss Barton.

“Pray, stay a while longer, Mister Ellis,” insisted Newton. “And keep Miss Barton company. I insist.”

“Then, sir, I shall.”

Newton retired to his library and, that being done, Miss Barton smiled sweetly at me and for several minutes we sat in silence, savouring our privacy, for this was the first time we had ever found ourselves alone, Mrs. Rogers having long before retired. Gradually, Miss Barton began to talk: about the war in the Netherlands and Mister Dryden’s newest book that was a translation of the works of Virgil, and Mister Southern’s latest play, being titled The Maid’s Last Prayer , which she had seen and very much enjoyed. It seemed that she was nervous and sought to find herself at ease in conversation.

“I did not see that one,” I confessed, although I might have added that her own uncle kept me too busy ever to go to see plays performed. “But I saw the one before, which was The Wives’ Excuse.”

“Which I have not seen. But I have read it. Tell me, Mister Ellis. Do you agree that cuckolds make themselves?”

“Not being married, it is a little difficult for me to speak about that condition,” I said. “But I should think that a wife would only ever be provoked to cuckold a husband because of his own failings.”

“That is my opinion also,” she said. “Although I do not think that because a man is married he must be a cuckold. For that would be scandal upon all women.”

“Yes, it would.”

In similar vein we spoke awhile, although I found it difficult to rid myself of the very vivid memory I still carried of the whore at Mrs. Marsh’s house, whose name was Deborah and who resembled Miss Barton as two peas in a pod — which made me sometimes tongue-tied, for I had the apprehension that at any moment Miss Barton might shrug off her Mantua and her silk embroidered corset and mount the dinner table and strike an indecent posture for my amusement.