Prophecy - Страница 22

‘Precisely. Because the lost book is believed to set forth the mystery of man’s divinity. It is the culmination of the Hermetic magic.’

‘They say it holds the secret of becoming equal to God,’ I whisper, picturing Howard’s pointed face, his beady eyes.

‘But where you and I understand that to mean through enlightenment or gnosis, Howard’s interpretation was much more literal,’ Dee says, leaning further in with a meaningful nod. ‘That was what troubled me.’

‘Literal, in what way?’

‘It was not divine knowledge Howard aspired to.’ He lowers his voice. ‘It was divine immortality.’

We fall silent for a moment, watching one another. Twice I open my mouth to say this is impossible, but each time something about Dee’s earnest grey stare deters me. His faith in magic, if by that we mean a world that lies beyond the bounds of our present knowledge or philosophy, is simpler and more trusting than my own. If the universe is infinite, as I believe, then it must surely contain an infinite number of possibilities that we have not yet imagined or attempted to harness, but the more I consider this, the more I discover in myself an instinctive scepticism towards the easy claims of alchemists and mountebanks and those who perform tricks of mind-reading from the backs of carts to a willing crowd. Could a man truly achieve immortality? And could one book really contain the key to open that door? Rumours and mythologies grow around lost books; they acquire extraordinary powers in their absence. But the lure of immortality — I can see how that would draw a man like Henry Howard.

‘So what happened?’

Dee sucks in his cheeks.

‘It was not just the Hermes book. It became increasingly clear that Howard’s interest in magic was not about knowledge but about power.’

‘Does the one not lead to the other?’ I say, with a sly smile.

‘For those who have the wisdom to use both judiciously. But not in the simplistic way he imagined. His elder brother had just been executed, don’t forget — the Howards had lost the best part of their lands and titles. He wanted a means of controlling and manipulating his way back to eminence. I glimpsed in him a ruthlessness that made me deeply uneasy. In the end, I told him that I could not go on teaching him.’

‘I imagine he took that badly.’

‘Oh yes. The Howards do not like to be thwarted. First, he offered more money. When I continued to refuse, he threatened me.’

‘With violence?’

Dee tugs at his beard and raises his head towards the window, a weight of great sorrow in his eyes.

‘Nothing so crude. He simply said he would destroy me. He said he would work against me like a subtle poison, so that not even those I counted my friends would acknowledge me. He dared me to put him to the test.’

‘But that was ten years ago,’ I say, meaning to be reassuring.

‘Yes, and here I still am. Oh, there has been much muttering against me over the years by the ignorant and the envious — that I conjure demons, speak with the dead, perform any number of forbidden and grisly rituals at dead of night with mummified corpses or stillborn children or I know not what. Thus far, Her Majesty has never paid attention to such foolishness.’ He lays a hand on my arm. ‘But I have never imagined that Henry Howard forgot his hatred or his threat. People like you and me, Bruno — we walk as if on fragile ice. We work at the very edge of knowledge, and that frightens many people. We can never know when the ground might fall away beneath our feet.’

He looks so melancholy that I press my hand over his and clasp it for a moment.

‘So, Howard’s response was to turn violently against all forms of occult knowledge?’ I say, indicating the book. Dee frowns.

‘Publicly, yes. But I have always wondered if he hasn’t secretly pursued his desire, using his piety against it as a cover. Henry Howard is nothing if not tenacious. Some fourteen years ago, it was thought that a copy of the lost manuscript of Hermes had been found. This part of the story you know, Bruno, from that rogue Jenkes.’

I nod, with feeling; Rowland Jenkes, the dealer in esoteric and forbidden books who had tried to kill me in Oxford.

‘Well, then,’ he continues, ‘you remember that Jenkes thought he had found the book buried in an Oxford college library. He wrote to me, knowing of my collection, and I travelled to Oxford to meet him. From what he let me see of the manuscript, I was sufficiently convinced to pay him a high price for it.’

‘You read it, then?’ I sit forward eagerly.

‘Only a small part of it,’ he says. ‘I can’t say for certain, but I believed it was by Hermes Trismegistus. My plan was to bring it back to London and immediately make a translation. Only I never had the chance. As you know, my servant and I were brutally set upon and robbed on the road the moment we left Oxford, and the book was taken.’

‘Jenkes told me about that,’ I say, nodding. ‘But he swore the theft was not his doing.’

‘At first I assumed it must have been, so that he could sell the book again,’ Dee says, absently rubbing at the back of his head as if the tale has opened the old wound. ‘I returned to Oxford to recover — I was quite badly injured in the attack — and confronted him, though of course he denied everything. But as time passed, it occurred to me that there were others besides Jenkes who wanted that book, and who would have had the means to pay spies in my household and villains to steal it from me on the road.’

‘Henry Howard?’ I look down at the book in my hands.

‘I have no proof. It is only a suspicion. But for years afterwards I asked everyone I knew, every collector and dealer in antiquities and manuscripts in England and all those I knew in Europe, and no one had heard any further word of the Hermes book. You can bet that if Jenkes had hired thieves to get it back, he would have attempted to trade it on for more profit. Which makes me believe it was stolen from me by someone who had no interest in selling it, but who wanted to keep it, to study its content.’

‘I suppose the only way to be certain is to try and kill Henry Howard,’ I say, keeping my expression serious. ‘If he proves to be immortal, we may reasonably assume he took the book and found it to be authentic.’

Dee chuckles softly. ‘Don’t tempt me, Bruno. In any case, this brings us no nearer to solving my dilemma.’

‘I thought that was your dilemma?’

‘I’m afraid it is more specific. Yesterday —‘ he hesitates, glances at the door — ‘Ned Kelley had a horrifying vision. He fears that the spirits have granted him sight of what will come to pass, and I must decide whether to warn the queen.’

I want to tell him not to be a fool; my cynicism about Kelley tightens in my chest like a hard bud, but Dee’s eyes are wide and his lips trembling slightly. More gently, I lean in towards him.

‘Go on.’

He takes a deep breath.

‘In the showing-stone, much as it was the time you observed, a spirit appeared to Ned as a red-haired woman in a white gown, with the symbols of the planets and all the signs of the zodiac embroidered on it. In her right hand she held a book and in her left a golden key.’

Kelley’s figures are always holding a book, I think to myself. Perhaps his imagination is running dry. ‘This is no figure I recognise,’ I say, shortly, though the moment he mentioned a red-haired woman my mind snapped instantly to Abigail Morley.

‘But there is more. She did not speak, but in the vision she unlaced her bodice and opened it for him —‘

‘I bet she did.’

‘Don’t mock, Bruno,’ he says, hurt. ‘Wait until you hear. On her breast she had a symbol engraved in blood …’

‘Was it the sign of Jupiter, by any chance?’ I say, unable to keep the sarcasm from my voice. But Dee looks stricken.

‘Sweet Jesus. No — but you are close. It was the sign of Saturn. How on earth could you know?’

I rise, infuriated, cross to the window and turn sharply back to him.

‘He has plucked this detail straight from the murder at court! Come, John — the man is a charlatan. He is playing you like a harp — can you not see it?’

‘But Ned goes nowhere near the court or those circles. How would he learn of a detail like that?’

‘It is the talk of London!’ I cry, exasperated. ‘He only has to step out of doors to hear people gossiping about it in the streets. He has picked up a handbill from somewhere, read the lurid descriptions and thought it would make a neat picture for his next invention! Do not lose sleep over it, for heaven’s sake.’

‘Now, Bruno.’ He looks weary. ‘I know you do not like Ned, but really — he is a very gifted scryer and you insult me to suggest otherwise. He speaks with the spirits in their own heavenly language. I have heard him.’

‘He is a criminal! Have you not seen his ears? That’s what they do to those who forge coins, is it not? And if he can counterfeit money, why not visions, and languages?’

‘Ned has led a hard life and has made his mistakes, but all that is in the past. He is an honest fellow now, Bruno. It is not for us to judge.’

I run my hands through my hair, grasping at handfuls; there will be no reasoning with him. ‘Christ’s body, John! You are entitled to make some judgement of a man if he is living off you. You are too soft-hearted.’

Dee smiles fondly. ‘This from the man who could not bear to hurt a mouse.’

We stare at each other, the mouse suddenly remembered. Dee rouses himself with surprising speed from his chair and hurries back through to the laboratory, his robe whipping behind him; I follow at a clip. Here among the stills, with their soft, intestinal murmurings, the atmosphere is more humid now, and more fetid. The room smells like a farm in a midsummer thunderstorm.