The System of the World: Volume Three of the Baroque Cycle

by Neal Stephenson

  My relationship with the Silver Comstocks is ancient, and ambiguous in the extreme; but recent generations have seen fit to denominate me a friend of the family. So hereinafter I shall refer to my lord the Earl of Lostwithiel as Will Comstock. Will confirmed what was already implied by the settlement of diverse wagers all round us, namely, that the day had gone badly for Bolingbroke and the Tories. The Marquis of Ravenscar has—by dint of plots, maneuvers, and skirmishes too diverse and far-fetched for my tired brain to hold or my cramped hand to write down—literally called the Secretary of the South Sea Company on the carpet. The call went out (sensationally) a week ago. It was answered a few hours ago, when the said Secretary appeared before the bar in Commons, and presented a book—a compendium of all the Company’s documents relating to the Asiento. The Tories regard this book as a lit granadoe, the Whigs as a golden apple, and it has moved back and forth between Commons and Lords this afternoon as the factions have exhausted all resources to put it where it can deal the most or the least damage. Important men have been reading from it aloud. It contains nothing to explain or excuse the disappearance of the slave-trade revenues. This shifts the burden of culpability to Bolingbroke, who was never viewed as an honest chap to begin with—even by his admirers.

  Note that only yesterday Commons voted to post £100,000 as a reward to anyone who apprehends the Pretender should he dare to set foot on British soil. So the tide, which was running strongly in Bolingbroke’s favor a fortnight ago, has quite reversed.

  Thus news. I confess I did not attend closely to young Will during his narration, so fascinated was I by the phizz of Mr. Threader. As a rule there is nothing to see in his face; but today it was a fascinating study in warring passions, such as no van Dyck could have rendered. As a Tory, Mr. Threader is troubled to see the Tories back on their heels, and as a money-scrivener he is horrified by the public airing of the South Sea Company’s soiled bedsheets. And yet, when Will told us that a Trial of the Pyx had been postponed indefinitely, it was impossible not to perceive relief, even elation, upon Mr. Threader’s face. He has lately been coming by at all hours, or mailing me curious, hastily written notes, concerning the investigation of the coinage that has been set afoot by Bolingbroke. H.B.M.’s Sec’y of State pursues this (as everyone knows) to discredit the Whigs; yet it causes Mr. Threader the most intense anxiety. When Will let it be known that the Pyx would be unmolested for at least two months, Mr. Threader’s face was suddenly illuminated from within, like a Jack-o’-lantern receiving its candle. He excused himself and lit out for the City.

  Will and I both marked this. But Will is better bred than I, and does not like to gossip about others behind their backs. So he changed the subject, or rather deflected it, with a wry remark: “Mr. Threader’s worries about the direction of the markets would be as nothing if the Duchess of Qwghlm got her hands round his neck.” I inquired as to why Eliza would wish to strangle an old money-scrivener. Will replied that he and Eliza had met recently to discuss the Prop. of the Eng. for R.W. by F. Will had mentioned in passing that Engines were, in certain applications, an alternative to Slavery—and thereby triggered a spate of ranting from the Duchess as to the evils of that Institution, of the So. Sea Co., and all who like Mr. Threader credit its loathsome Equity. I had been chary of over-stressing this during my talks with Eliza, for fear that I would seem to manipulate her well-known passions on this subject, however it was clear from Will’s account that she has been pondering it. The recent turning of the tide against the So. Sea Co. may give comfort to Eliza that to invest in the P.E.R.W.F. is not only Shrewd but Righteous. At any rate, Will seemed to say, by a well-timed wink, that such an investment is now in the works. He then changed subject again, inquiring as to the progress of the Logic Mill, and expressing polite curiosity about the same. I let him know that, just as a printer sends proof-sheets to his client, we were making ready to ship a sample of our golden cards to our investor in the east. True to form, I did not fail to mention that we would benefit from certain financial expediencies. Will seemed to expect this; he allowed that he might be the bearer of some news concerning it, and handed me a sealed message from Eliza. Then he drained his coffee-cup and most courteously excused himself.

  As I glance downriver I see a flotilla of watermen’s boats approaching, drawn hither by the comely spectacle of a long queue of fuming Quality stamping their spurs in frustration. So I shall conclude directly. I opened Eliza’s message. Out of it fell a smaller piece of paper. The message describes Will—grudgingly—as “a good Tory” and “worth knowing” and states that she and he have arrived at an agreement. This by itself would have been enough to improve my day considerably; but it was perfected by the smaller document, which was a goldsmith’s note, drawn on the House of Hacklheber, and made out to your humble correspondent. There is enough here to support the operations of Clerkenwell Court for a week, and I flatter myself that she will see fit to provide another installment when it has been spent. We should have three card-punching organs installed at Bridewell within a fortnight; Hannah Spates is already training the women to make them work.

  The queue is coming to life, like a torpid snake warmed by the sun; I close for now; an errand of a rather different nature awaits me.

  Another damned coffee-house environs me—this time, it is in Warwick Court, behind the Old Bailey, and hard by the College of Physicians. I am surrounded half by barristers and half by Physicians, and cannot say which group I like less. Were I in legal trouble or sick or both I should of course change my tune.

  When I reached the head of that queue I was complaining of, I took a water taxi to Black Friars Stairs, and thence a sedan chair up to the Old Bailey. It was even more crowded than the Houses of Parliament, for the Court of Sessions had been at work there for much of the day, and had just adjourned. I looked about until I saw a man who stood head and shoulders above the crowd. When I made my way over to him I discovered, as usual, Mr. Kikin, somewhere down about his midsection. He let it be known, by the look on his face, that I was late. After a curt exchange of greetings he turned his back on me and marched into the court-yard where the accused and their supporters and detractors mill about under the open sky, shelterless against rain and judicial wrath. In this he was working upstream against the flow of that Mobb who had come to mourn or to cheer the decisions of the magistrates. But he used his bodyguard to good effect, as a sort of human ram. Had he not been so precipitious I’d have counseled him to wait for the crowd to disperse, and the air to clear. By venturing in among them thus he was exposing himself to the gaol-fever, which is easily spread from the sheeppen where the prisoners are kept, to the spectators, and thence out into the streets of London. But it was too late. I was on the horns of a dilemma: follow Kikin and risk the pestilence, or stay behind, alone, to be enveloped by a Mobb of persons no less dangerous than the convicted who were even now being herded off to their fates. I followed Kikin, not without some buffeting in that bottle-neck that leads into the court-yard from the street.

  Once we had debouched into the yard, the crowding abated, and I breathed a little freer. Weather has been dry of late, so it was more dusty than muddy. The brazier in which the branding-irons are kept at the ready was still glowing, and spinning up a plume of sharply scented coal-smoke, which I phant’sied might cleanse the air of whatever miasma causes the gaol-fever. I stood near it, reading the red-hot letters of iron strewn about in the coals, viz. V for Vagabond, T for Thief, &c., and keeping an eye on Mr. Kikin to see where he would alight. The magistrates, clerks, &c., had already abandoned the high covered veranda from which justice is dispensed. Most of the spectators, as I have mentioned, had already departed. Those who remained had all gravitated to the wooden walls of the pens where the men and women prisoners are kept. They were reaching over the barriers to pass purses of coins, loaves of bread, apples, &c., to their friends, children, wives, and husbands on the other side, who raked in these prizes with fettered and scabrous hands. The bailiffs were of course herding a
ll of the prisoners towards the Janus Gate. They made no move to interfere with the transactions I have just described, well knowing that most of the money being handed over in those shabby little purses would presently be in their own pockets. Of course, material goods were not all that passed over that barricade; there were kisses, hand-clasps, weeping, wailing, and declarations of love æternal, particularly in the cases of the ones who’d just been given tickets to Tyburn. But I will elide these, on a pretext that they are not germane. In truth, it is too pathetic for words.

  Standing at the northeast extremity of the yard, round the pillars of the Janus Gate, were several men who did not weep, wail, or proffer coin-purses. They only stood, backs to the gate, facing the flow of prisoners, and watched. It was a wonder to see them. From their postures you might identify them from a distance as mere idlers. But as I approached—following Mr. Kikin—I noted that these men wore curious expressions on their phizzes: each was as intent as a cat in the instant before it pounces upon an unsuspecting bird. These men were not idling, but working, practicing their profession with as full attention as the late Mr. Hooke when he would peer through his microscope at a swarm of animalcules. Some of the prisoners passing through the Janus Gate were oblivious; their faces were scanned and committed to memory. Others, wiser in the ways of the flash world, recognized these loiterers as thief-takers, and hid their faces behind their sleeves, or even walked backwards until they had passed safely through the gate. Some of the thief-takers stooped to childish but effective tricks, as calling out names: “John! Bob! Tom!” which made certain prisoners turn their way, the better for their faces to be inspected and their moles, scars, missing teeth, &c., to be memorized.

  The only prisoners who are of no interest to the thief-takers are those who’ve just been condemned to Tyburn. The others stand a fair chance to get out of Newgate alive, and to return to their former ways and dwelling-places. Once a thief-taker has committed such a man’s face to memory, he is liable to be re-arrested and prosecuted at any moment. It makes little difference whether he has in truth committed a crime; the Court wants a culprit, and the thief-taker wants reward-money.

  Sean Partry was conspicuous, among thief-takers, by his age (I should estimate he is in his middle fifties) and by a bearing—I am tempted to call it dignity—wanting in the others. He has a good head of hair, only a bit thin on top, blond going gray, and sea-green eyes. He has an excellently carved set of teeth, but displays them rarely. He has a trim figure—unusual in a profession that consists largely of loitering round taverns—but any illusion that he is especially fit is dispelled when he begins to move, for he is a little bit halt and a little bit lame, stiff in the joints, and given to frequent sighs and grimaces that hint at pains internal.

  Partry would on no account look us in the eye, or pay us any heed whatever, until the last of the prisoners had been herded through the gate. Then he began to interrogate us rather brusquely, wanting to know who we were, whom we represented, and why we desired to know so many things about Jack the Coiner. He was indifferent, and almost hostile, until we began to give substantive answers to his questions. Then he showed us more favor, and even consented to let Mr. Kikin buy him a drink at a public house down the way. He seemed well-informed as to politics, showing interest in my relation of the day’s events at Westminster.

  I told the story of the explosion in Crane Court, and listed the names of those who might have been its intended victim: Mr. Threader, Sir Isaac, Henry Arlanc, and your humble correspondent. Partry made some small remark about each, guessing rightly that Arlanc was a Huguenot name, and showing genuine curiosity about Newton. This is not so remarkable, as Newton has had many occasions to treat with thief-takers in catching and prosecuting coiners, and for all I know, might even have lined Partry’s own pocket with some reward-money. He showed rather less interest in Mr. Kikin’s account of the burning of the Russian ship at Rotherhithe. Partry is of the view that the latter event was a job that Jack was paid to do by Swedish or other foreign agents, and as such, offers little insight into Jack’s motives. That Partry has bothered to consider this matter at all, and has already formed views on it, gave me a favorable character of the man. Kikin seemed to agree. We asked Partry whether he thought he might be of service to us, and he allowed as how he might; but not terribly soon. “My methods are my methods,” he announced, by way of explaining that he would not be able to offer us any news until Friday, the 30th of July, or shortly before it. Kikin was dismayed. Partry reminded him that it would probably take that long anyway to negotiate a fee. Then he departed.

  My conversation with Mr. Kikin now went into a few minutes’ recess, as he does not like to stay in any one place for more than a few minutes. We paid our bill and wandered round a few corners to the coffee-house where I now sit writing these words. Kikin was nonplussed by the way Partry had moved from the vague assertion that it would take a long time, to the specific one that it would happen on the thirtieth of July. I treated it as a riddle, asking the addled Russian, could he not think of any event on that day that would explain Mr. Partry’s confidence.

  In the end Kikin resorted to pulling out the little waste-book where he writes down his social engagements. Flipping forward to 30 July, he found a page that was blank, save for one notation: HANGINGS. Meaning that the next Hanging-March to Tyburn was to be on that day, and so he had avoided making any appointments, knowing how difficult it would be to move through the Mobb-choked streets.

  “Several men have lately been found guilty of coining,” I explained. “On the thirtieth they shall be taken to Tyburn to be half-hanged, drawn, and quartered. Such men, being coiners, may have information about Jack. Being as they are afraid of Jack, they’ll not let a word slip for the time being. But as the thirtieth of the month looms nearer, fear of Jack Ketch will grow to out-weigh fear of Jack Shaftoe. In those last few days, they may be persuaded, by one such as Sean Partry, to tell what they know concerning Jack, in exchange for lenient treatment at the Fatal Tree.”

  “You mean Partry can arrange a pardon!?” demanded Kikin, who was ready to be scandalized by our judicial laxity.

  “No. But if we supply money to Partry, he may pass some of it on to Jack Ketch, who will then see to it that the prisoner in question receives a quick hanging—a neck-snapper instead of a slow strangler—so that he’ll not be alive to know he is being disembowelled.”

  “This is a strange country,” Kikin observed. I could say nothing.

  Kikin is aghast that it will take so long to get answers. I believe he has made a mental calculation of how long it might take for the Russian galley, presently at Orney’s Ship-yard in Rotherhithe, to get back to St. Petersburg, and then to return to London bringing some furious Russian count empowered to sack Mr. Kikin and bring him home in chains.

  I let him know that I had a package of golden cards ready to ship out on that galley, which is supposed to depart very soon. This cheered him up, and he resolved to go to Clerkenwell Court that very instant to collect the plates. He is gone now, and I await here a trusted messenger who will bear the Duchess of Qwghlm’s goldsmith’s note to my banker in the City, William Ham. I am left, a strange man in a strange country, wondering how I got here, and what shall befall me next.

  Your humble and obedient servant,

  Daniel Waterhouse

  Westminster Palace

  9 JULY 1714

  A Message from the Lords, by Mr. Holford and Mr. Lovibond:

  Mr. Speaker,

  We are commanded by the Lords to acquaint this House, That they, having this Day under their Examination Matters relating to the South Sea Company, which are of great Consequence to the Trade of this Kingdom, do desire that this House will give Leave to such Members of this House as are of the Committee of the South Sea Company for the Assiento; and William Lowndes Esquire; may have Leave to attend the House of Lords this Day.

  And then the Messengers withdrew

  Resolved, That this House doth give Leave to such Memb
ers…to go to the House of Lords, if they think fit.

  And the Messengers were called in again, and Mr. Speaker acquainted them therewith.

  Jovis, 8° die Julii;

  Anno 13° Annæ Reginæ, 1714

  Ordered, That a Message be sent to the Lords, to desire, That they will direct the Painted Chamber, the Lobby, and the Passage to the House of Peers, to be cleared from any Crowd, when this House shall come up thither, by her Majesty’s Command, to attend her Majesty.

  Ordered, That Mr. Campion do carry the said Message.

  Ordered, That the Serjeant at Arms attending this House do clear the Lobby of this House, and Passage leading to the Painted Chamber, from the Persons therein, for the better Passage of this House to the House of Peers…

  A Message from her Majesty, by Sir William Oldes, Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod:

  Mr. Speaker,

  The Queen commands this honourable House to attend her Majesty in the House of Peers, immediately.

  Accordingly, Mr. Speaker, with the House, went up to attend her Majesty, in the House of Peers: Where her Majesty was pleased to give the Royal Assent to several publick and private Bills: