The Emperor of all Things

by Paul Witcover

  ‘Mad? Perhaps – though the line between madness and genius is a thin and permeable one, I find. But you’re right that he did not belong to your Worshipful Company. After Wachter vanished, my father wrote to London. The guild had never heard of him.’

  ‘He should have written sooner.’

  ‘No doubt. But there was no evidence that Wachter was not exactly who and what he claimed to be. During the time he was with us, he laboured steadily on the tower clock and continued repairing our timepieces, as well as building new ones, all of which functioned perfectly.’

  ‘And how long was he with you?’

  ‘Nearly ten years,’ Doppler answered, then added defensively: ‘A tower clock is not built in a day.’

  ‘Still, Herr Doppler, do you mean to tell me that in ten years, no one in Märchen suspected there was anything odd about the tower clock going up right in their midst?’

  ‘How could we suspect? We are not experts in such things.’

  ‘The first true clockman to pass through town would have exposed him as a fraud.’

  ‘No doubt you are right, but no clockman did pass through. Those were unsettled times, Herr Gray. All of Europe was at war. Men did not wander so far off the beaten track as they do today.’

  ‘Yet Märchen couldn’t possibly have supplied him with all the necessary materials for such a project. Orders must have been placed, supplies delivered.’

  ‘Even in dangerous times, men will seek profit. Especially in such times.’

  It was strange, but though Doppler’s answers to my questions were quite reasonable, I nevertheless felt myself becoming suspicious of them … and of him. His answers were too reasonable, if you see what I mean. Every objection I raised was so smoothly deflected that I couldn’t help wondering what he was hiding. ‘Go on,’ I prompted.

  ‘There is not much more to tell,’ he said with a shrug. ‘As agreed, we built him a fine house and provided him with everything he needed to live among us in comfort, if not luxury. The years passed as I have told you. Herr Wachter became a fixture of the town, as did his daughter, who grew to young womanhood among us – with no shortage of suitors, I might add, though she showed them scant encouragement; Wachter, like many widowers, was a stern and jealous father. Yet they both seemed content enough here. And one day, at long last, the tower was finished. A ceremony was set for the next day, at which the clock would be blessed by the minister and set to running. But Märchen was awakened before dawn that very morning by the bells of the clock, and I’m sure it will come as less of a surprise to you than it did to us that the hour being tolled so beautifully by those bells was not the same hour we saw registered upon our household clocks, many of which had been made by Wachter. A crowd gathered before the clock tower, where it was discovered that the hands of the clock were moving willy-nilly, as if they possessed a life of their own. But it wasn’t until Wachter was sent for that we received the biggest shock of all: he and his daughter were gone, vanished in the night. He must have planned their escape for a long time, using all the genius he employed in his clock-making endeavours, for no trace of them was ever found.’

  ‘Perhaps they perished, fell into a crevasse like Inge’s husband.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘She told me earlier that he was dead – Herr Wachter, I mean.’

  ‘A logical enough assumption, but not personal knowledge. Wachter was fifty-two years old when he disappeared. He would be over a hundred today. I suppose it’s possible he might still be alive somewhere, but it hardly seems likely.’

  ‘And he left behind no explanation for his strange actions?’

  ‘Only the clock itself. It explains everything … and nothing.’

  ‘Why in the name of heaven didn’t your father have the clock repaired at once, when the extent of Wachter’s mischief was apparent?’

  At this, Doppler tugged at one end of his moustache. ‘He tried, Herr Gray. He wrote to our own Clockmakers’ Guild in Augsburg, requesting that someone be sent to us. A journeyman was duly dispatched.’

  ‘It proved beyond his skill?’

  ‘Beyond his sanity, rather. He entered the clock tower and remained inside for a day and a night. At last, the bailiff went in after him. The man was found lying in one corner, his eyes wide open and unblinking, his body stiff as a corpse. But he was not dead, merely cataleptic.’

  ‘My God – what happened?’

  ‘A significant shock to mind and body, or so said the apothecary. After a few days, the man was able to move again, after a fashion, but his mind never recovered. I won’t trouble you with his ravings. They were utterly without sense. Some time later, the guild sent a master clockmaker. The result was identical. No further attempts were made. The entrance to the tower was bricked shut; no one has entered since.’

  ‘Why, I suspect you are telling me a fairy tale, Herr Doppler!’ I could not forbear from exclaiming.

  ‘It is the gospel truth, I assure you.’

  ‘And I suppose you will have a ready answer as well for why the clock was not destroyed after all this?’

  If Doppler took offence, he didn’t show it. In fact, he seemed more amused than anything. ‘That was supposed to happen, Herr Gray. My father received an order to that effect from the guildmaster in Augsburg; such orders, as you may not be aware, being a foreigner, carry the weight of imperial writ. He wrote back stating that he had complied. That ended the matter. As far as the Clockmakers’ Guild is concerned, Wachter’s Folly is no more.’

  ‘Was your father in the habit of disregarding imperial decrees?’ I asked.

  ‘Hardly,’ Doppler replied with a tight smile. ‘But in this case, or so he told me later, he felt that disobedience was the lesser betrayal.’

  ‘I’m afraid you’ve lost me.’

  Doppler glanced at his pocket watch, lying open on the table. He picked it up, snapped the lid shut. ‘I will show you.’ He got to his feet, sliding the watch back into his coat. Then he lifted the candle. ‘Come with me.’

  ‘But where …?’

  ‘Not far. Come.’ He walked to the swinging door and held it open.

  Intrigued, I stood. Hesta, too, bestirred herself. Toenails clicking across the stone floor, she preceded us both through the door. Doppler motioned for me to follow her, which I did, and he brought up the rear. Then , holding the candle before him, he stepped past me and alongside the wooden bar, once again motioning me to follow.

  He stopped opposite the cuckoo clock that hung on the wall behind the bar. By the light of the candle, which Doppler placed on the bar, I saw that it was just shy of one o’clock.

  ‘In a moment, Herr Gray,’ Doppler said in a hushed voice, perhaps afraid of waking Inge, whose room was downstairs, or so I gathered, ‘you will have the answer to your question. Or the beginnings of an answer.’

  I had noticed the clock earlier but hadn’t examined it closely. Now that I did, I recognized Wachter’s craftsmanship: there, in miniature, carved into the dark walnut housing, was the same hellish scene depicted upon Märchen’s tower clock. Only here the crowd of the tormented and their tormentors was roughly done, like a study for the larger and more complex composition outside. The figures were blocky, ill-defined, their faces possessing crude features, like marks gouged by a hasty knife, or no features at all. They seemed to be engaged in a struggle to keep themselves from losing definition and sinking into each other, into the wood itself, as if it were the nature of hell to dissolve all distinctions, on every level, mixing matter into a primordial soup of suffering from which, by some supreme effort of stubborn will, or an impulse of pain impossible to imagine, the old body reshaped itself for a time, to undergo again, and yet again, into eternity, the stripping away of flesh from bone, of bone from spirit, of self from self. I wondered what remained after such a scouring. Was it the soul? Or could that, too, be unravelled and reknit, broken down and built up again for ever and ever?

  Across the bar, the minute hand of the cuckoo clock jerked upright. A whi
rring commenced within the housing. I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the bar, intent not to miss anything of whatever was about to occur.

  The small doors at the top of the clock flipped open, and out popped the strangest-looking bird I had ever seen. But even as it spread glimmering bronze wings, I realized that it was no bird at all. It was a dragon.

  The automaton – no bigger than my thumb – was exquisitely crafted. Its metal wings were supple in their flexing, and its barbed tail lashed from side to side in the manner of a cat’s. Arching its neck in a sinuous movement, the mechanical dragon cocked its horned head to one side and seemed to regard me with curiosity through jewel-like eyes. The craftsmanship was extraordinary; I could almost believe I was looking at a living creature. Then the mouth opened, revealing rows of silvery, needle-sharp teeth and a tongue the colour of cold iron. A loud hiss emerged, as from a boiling tea kettle, and I stepped back, reminded of my dream. Even as I did so, a jet of flame gushed from between the mechanism’s jaws. It extended no more than an inch, but so unexpected was the display that I gave a start and cried out as though I had been scorched.

  Doppler laughed with childlike glee as the automaton was pulled back into the housing. The tiny doors snapped shut behind it; the minute hand jerked forward.

  ‘Tell me, Herr Gray,’ he demanded, ‘have you ever seen such a wonder?’

  I could truthfully admit that I had not – not in all my travels.

  ‘Here it is no exception,’ Doppler stated. ‘Just one of many marvels left to us by Herr Wachter.’

  ‘I should like to examine the workings,’ I said.

  ‘As to that, you must ask Inge. The clock is hers.’

  ‘I have read of such marvels,’ I mused. ‘It is said that the court of Byzantium was filled with automatons all but indistinguishable from the birds and animals they resembled. But those secrets were lost with the city.’

  Doppler shrugged. ‘Perhaps they survived. Or Herr Wachter rediscovered them.’

  ‘And you say there are more clocks like this one?’

  ‘Not precisely the same as this, no, but many others are as distinctive in their way. Herr Wachter lived among us for ten years. He was not idle.’ Doppler slipped out his pocket watch and laid it on the bar. ‘Go on, take it.’

  I did so with alacrity.

  ‘You are holding Wachter’s personal timepiece,’ Doppler told me with pride. ‘My father admired it so often that Wachter finally presented it to him as a gift. And my father passed it on to me. Go on – open it.’

  I complied. There, on the face, I saw strange and indeed incomprehensible shapes standing, as it were, in place of numbers, and hands that had the shape of a dragon. Herr Wachter, it seemed, had been obsessed with dragons.

  ‘Hold it to your ear,’ Doppler directed.

  I did so under his expectant gaze. But I heard nothing of interest. In fact, I heard nothing at all. ‘It’s stopped,’ I said.

  ‘Indeed, it has not.’

  ‘I hear no ticking.’

  ‘There is none to hear.’

  ‘But when you wind the watch, how—’

  ‘It is not wound,’ Doppler interrupted. ‘The stem is merely decorative.’

  I gave the stem a gentle twist. It did not budge. ‘Then how is the watch powered?’

  ‘I do not know. But it has never run down in all these years. My father did not permit the casing to be opened, fearing that to do so would destroy the mechanism within, and I have followed his wise example.’ He extended his hand; with regret, I laid the watch in his palm.

  After Herr Doppler had put away the watch, I pressed him again for permission to examine the tower clock.

  ‘Imagine,’ he replied, ‘that we were in England, and thus under the jurisdiction of your guild. What do you suppose your masters in the Worshipful Company would make of our tower clock, or the other timepieces you have seen here?’

  I knew the answer only too well. They would not permit such unique timepieces to exist. Every last one would be disassembled, stripped of its secrets, and destroyed. But to admit that would have been to scuttle my chances. ‘I cannot say,’ I told him.

  ‘You are being disingenuous,’ he returned. ‘We both know what their verdict would be. What your verdict, as their faithful representative, must be. You have already made your judgement, Herr Gray. Do not bother to deny it.’

  ‘How can I judge what I do not understand?’

  ‘You judge because you do not understand. That is the way of your Worshipful Company, and indeed of our own Clockmakers’ Guild.’

  ‘That is not my way,’ I insisted. ‘I left England to search out just such timepieces as these. I wish to learn from them, not destroy them.’

  ‘You wish to plunder them, rather, to take their secrets for your own. Can you deny it?’

  ‘I am a scientist, Herr Doppler. I proceed by experiment and observation. By reason. How can the science of horology advance unless such marvels as the timepieces of Märchen become part of the common stock of knowledge available to all horologists?’

  He laughed. ‘Ah, so you are an altruist, then. You would share your knowledge with the world and not keep it for the advantage of your guild and country. Forgive me, sir, but I am not so naïve as to believe that.’

  ‘For more than two years now, I have been on a quest of sorts,’ I told him. ‘A quest that has taken me halfway around the world and finally brought me here. I had not heard the name Wachter before yesterday, and yet I have known of him – indeed, I have seen his handiwork in my travels, hints and clues that pointed towards something grander, more fully realized: that pointed, in short, to Märchen. Perhaps you will think me deluded, but I believe that someone – call him Wachter if you like – has led me here for a purpose. I am meant to examine these timepieces.’

  ‘So you think that Wachter is still alive, do you?’ Doppler mused. ‘You think that he has somehow been a step ahead of you in your travels, leaving behind examples of his craftsmanship like a trail of breadcrumbs for you to follow. And you accuse me of telling fairy tales?’

  I confess I blushed at that. ‘I know it sounds far-fetched,’ I admitted. ‘Yet I also know what I have seen. Wachter – or some horological wizard with intimate knowledge of his work – has brought me here. There is something I am supposed to learn. Something I am supposed to do …’

  ‘I think perhaps it is a good thing that my daughter took your tool kit,’ Doppler said. ‘She acted rashly, precipitately, as she is wont to do, but her instincts were sound. You are a dangerous man, Herr Gray.’

  ‘You think me mad?’

  ‘Worse – sincere. You are determined to examine our timepieces regardless of the risk to them … and to yourself.’

  ‘Is that a threat, Herr Doppler? Am I to be arrested? Expelled from town? Or will I simply vanish, swallowed by the snows like Inge’s husband?’

  At this, Doppler’s white whiskers seemed to bristle like the fur of a cat. ‘Do you think we are barbarians, criminals? We are civilized people! I am concerned for your welfare, Herr Gray. Recall the fate of your predecessors who ventured inside the clock tower.’

  ‘I am willing to take the risk. I would promise to touch nothing, simply to observe, if you would allow me to enter the tower – or to examine the workings of any of the timepieces here.’

  ‘As to the tower clock, that is off-limits. But you are otherwise free to ply your trade.’

  ‘You will return my tool kit, then?’

  ‘We are no more thieves than murderers, Herr Gray. Of course your property will be returned.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Why, that is up to you. By all means, advertise your services. Make your ambition known. Who can say? Perhaps one of our citizens will bring you a clock or watch made or enhanced by Wachter. Or you may persuade Inge to let you examine her cuckoo.’

  I confess I blushed at that, for it seemed to me that Herr Doppler was alluding to something other than the clock whose operation we had just witnesse
d. I remembered the yeasty smell that had emanated from the corpulent woman, as if she were a loaf of bread freshly removed from the oven, and how that smell had stirred a hunger in me to lose myself in her flesh – a hunger that had, or so I believed, somehow transmuted itself into the succubus-like figure that had invaded my dream. I was a younger man then, and such wayward expressions of desire embarrassed me. I still had much to learn of life and of love. ‘And you will not impede me from plying my trade?’ I asked Doppler.

  ‘As long as you do not attempt to force the issue, no.’

  ‘For that I thank you.’

  Doppler inclined his head. ‘I have no doubt that you will abide by our agreement,’ he said. ‘Your tool kit will be returned tomorrow. And now, Herr Gray, I must bid you good night. I do not have far to go, but the snow will make my journey home a tedious one, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Why not remain here, at the inn? Surely Inge has an extra room.’

  ‘Are you a father, Herr Gray?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Then you will not understand. But I find I cannot sleep a wink if I am not under the same roof as my daughter. She is all I have left, you see, since the loss of her mother.’

  ‘I am sorry.’

  ‘Ach, it was years ago,’ he said, making a dismissive gesture with one hand. ‘In truth, we were badly matched, she and I. It amazes me still to think that such an ill-suited union could have produced a treasure like Corinna. I hope you will not hold her indiscretion against her, Herr Gray. She is a good girl at heart.’

  ‘I have no ill feelings,’ I assured him, ‘and shall tell her so when I meet her.’

  ‘She will be relieved to hear it, I am sure,’ he replied and took his leave.