Maxie’s Demon

by Michael Scott Rohan

  Dee had actually socked Kelley a beauty, right in the eye. I cheered. Before Adam could grab him he landed another, with his staff this time, on Kelley’s unprotected head, and a fine follow-through to the nose. Adam caught his free hand and stood there like a gigantic nanny with two squalling toddlers.

  Rabbi Loew’s quick glance to heaven summed it all up. ‘Do you feel well enough to walk? I would have Adam carry you, but—’ He shrugged. ‘In any event we must leave before the rain comes, and with discretion. There has been enough light on this hill already to attract the attention of His Majesty’s guard. Not to mention his witchfinders.’

  There was a fresh outbreak of snarling. ‘Compose yourself, gentlemen! Or must you be tied into your saddles against our return?’ He left them dangling and went to tidy up his own paraphernalia. After a moment I did my shaky best to pack up Dee’s for him. He was silent now, head hanging, utterly despondent.

  ‘I shall leave this place,’ he said. ‘Leave, and in shame. If all my researches have been follies—’

  ‘Oh no you don’t!’ snarled Kelley. ‘His pissant Majesty isn’t going to let you, believe me! You’re going to stay – and you’re going to help me, you hear?’

  ‘Oh no he isn’t!’ I said, and I relished it with every fibre of my being. This bastard had strained most of them, anyway. ‘He’s finished with you. In fact, you scabby son of a bitch, we’re all fucking finished with you, and you are completely washed up. The wipe. The cleaners. The workover. Two rinses and the bloody starch! Zat clear?’

  Man, I was enjoying this. ‘The Doctor and I are going back to the city. And he’s going to show me all the way home again – aren’t you, Doc?’

  Dee nodded silently, still hanging his head. ‘Right!’ I crowed. ‘And you are going back with Adam and the Rabbi here, and if you’re very, very good he’s going to turn you loose somewhere along the way. Outside the walls, of course, and if you know what’s good for you, you won’t try and get back in. That’s the only deal on the table, and you can thank the Rabbi on your bended knees. If it were me pushing Adam’s buttons he’d just put you down right here and sit on you, but then I’m not religious.’

  ‘You get of a spavined sow!’ snarled Kelley. ‘Had you not come crashing your way in—’

  ‘You’d have been in my shoes, sure. And you’d have deserved it. Believe me, nobody’s ever done you a bigger favour.’

  Kelley snarled something pretty remarkable.

  ‘Have it your own way,’ I told him. ‘Next time I smell a sewer, baby, I’ll think of you.’

  And so we parted, for the moment. Give Dee his due, he bowed to the Rabbi, properly, and made a nice little speech. Loew went equally solemn on him, made just as nice a speech, then cheerfully ruined the effect with a little mazel tov gesture to me. Then off he went into the gathering rain, with the clay giant shaking the hillside at his heels, Kelley tucked neatly under its arm. We headed back to our horses, with Dee still shaking his head and sighing.

  ‘Poor Edward! Poor Edward! So precipitate a man, you know. So eager to have such things be true. I am sure that must be what made him—’

  I stopped him. ‘No you don’t, Doc. Next minute you’ll be saying he’s just a dreamer who deluded himself. That’s always the con-man’s last defence line, in my day. It isn’t true. They’re just lying bastards.’

  Walter Mittys, they always called themselves – or their mouthpieces did. But Mitty didn’t try to sell anyone his dreams.

  ‘No, no, Master Maxie—’

  I bridled. ‘Look, take it from me. I am one.’

  For the first time that night Dee looked amused. ‘No, Master Maxie. That you are not. Were it so, you would have taken Edward’s part from the beginning, or those creatures. Instead you have liberated me from, yes, a most monstrous imposture. As a coney-catcher, young sir, you are an utter failure. Indeed, I detect that you are sickening for honesty.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Well, there aren’t any cars around here.’

  ‘Are you sure you wish to go home, then?’

  ‘Yes. God, any time – right now! Sort of. I mean … Shit!’

  ‘You may reconsider. My son is too young, and shows little disposition to aid me in my studies. I have no assistant now. Nor brother. Nor has my lady Jane.’

  And if I told you that didn’t start me thinking, I really would be a lying bastard.

  She was waiting back at the house, her and Joan Kelley. That gave me a nasty moment, till they started dancing around as they saw us come back. Yes, they. Mistress Kelley as well; and she rushed just as avidly to greet Dee. And when he told them they would be going home …

  ‘Her too?’ I asked Jane Dee as she bustled joyously about, organising a huge feast of a dinner, bossing the maids about in dreadful hog-German.

  ‘Aye, aye, poor lass!’ sighed Jane, pausing in her whirl of tablecloths to fan her glowing cheeks. ‘Hadst not known? She was main unhappy with that wretch, and cordially he hated her. Always he said it was the angels had made him marry her – aye, the golden angels in her purse, he meant! Now she’ll back to England with my John and me, and keep house with us together, for she’s a mighty fine mistress of a kitchen – finer than I, who was bred to court only.’

  So that was one more weight off my mind. But it wasn’t the only surprise I had coming from Joan Kelley. I still felt I ought to say something to her, but when I tried I was enveloped in an overwhelming hug. ‘Wronged me?’ was what I managed to get out of her broad dialect. ‘Nay, never say that! You are my brave gentleman who has freed me from a monstrous dirty beast! The angels this and the angels that, and scarce a finger he’d lay upon me, for all he was so ready upon my lady Jane, stale upon his head!’ She chuckled conspiratorially. ‘Yet never a patch he was on good Doctor John, for all his years!’

  It hadn’t occurred to me that a swap went both ways. ‘You mean … you and Dee?’

  She gave a tremendously dirty giggle, and suddenly she didn’t look nearly so much like a potato. ‘Oo, there be a thing to ask!’ She dug me in the ribs. ‘But never I could refuse you nothing, young sir. Oh, a fine man that is, for all his years. Very hot in the blood, aye; very upstanding. And my poor dear lady Jane, she so cold and thin and dignityfied, she’s never been much good to him. ’Tis a sound frame that sets him a-riggish, I can tell you. And now we’ll be free to sport at will, and my worthless husband go shake his ears about the world. But mark you, dear young sir, not a word to my lady! Not a word!’

  I don’t think I could have said anything if you paid me. And for me, that’s serious.

  Ah well – chacun à son gout, as the old maid said when she kissed the cat. Clearly it was time to be getting home, all right. I couldn’t keep up with these people.

  There were things to be done first, though, obligations to be fulfilled. You didn’t just slink off from an emperor’s court. Dee, as head of the party, would have to go get his leave. That would take a little time, but somehow I didn’t think he would have much difficulty, not now. In the meantime he would see me back through the sewers, and return on his own. But first we both had another call to make, a lot less illustrious but even more of an obligation.

  The evening after it found us hooded and cloaked again, coming back from the Jewish Quarter. Dee had given me money to buy the Rabbi a gift, though he agreed with me it would probably find its way to the poor soon enough; and he had added a rare manuscript from his own library. I was coming to like the old bugger a lot more lately.

  We were chatting quite cheerfully as we turned back down the street to Dee’s gate, wondering what we could possibly have bought Adam – about a ton of clay and a model of the Venus de Milo? – when another figure sprang out in our path. Right in our path – and sprang is maybe the wrong word. He slunk, but the way a starving leopard slinks. He slunk; and he stunk, worse than ever, still in his rich robe, now somewhat thorn-tattered, with his hose encrusted up to the thighs.

  ‘Well,’ I said thoughtfully, contemplating the knife he wa
s holding. ‘We know which way you got back in, don’t we?’

  Kelley snarled. ‘Away out so late, masters? I’ve been watching hereabouts, waiting. There’s some folk on their way down to see you, by the look of it. Shall we not wait till they come?’

  And just then, indeed, I heard the familiar rattle and clank of the Imperial guard, bashing hell out of the cobbles. Dee and I looked at one another, drew a deep breath, hastily regretted it, and stepped back a pace or two. The pikemen were already rounding the corner.

  ‘Perhaps I should have called upon His Highness sooner …’ muttered Dee.

  ‘Guards!’ shouted Kelley. ‘Over here! Here!’

  They came marching right up to us without a break in step, and halted with an epic clank.

  ‘You!’ raved Kelley to their captain. ‘I know you, you understand some English, don’t you? Arrest me these two dangerous sorcerers who are hindering me making the Emperor his gold! It’s been their fault all along—’

  The captain’s feet tormented the cobbles some more. ‘By authority of His Imperial Majesty, you are to be held under house arrest. You will please to enter the gate at once.’

  The last time I saw a grin like Kelley’s it was feeding time and it had stripes. Dee and I looked at one another and shrugged. The captain cleared his throat thunderously, and the pikemen trailed their weapons. Dee sighed and rapped on the gate. It swung open at the first blow, with never a servant in sight. I began to get a really nasty feeling, but there wasn’t a lot I could do about it – not in company, anyway.

  I pushed the door wide, and we went in, with the soldiers clinking along behind. The captain motioned us into the main chamber, and as I climbed the steps I saw Jane and Joan Kelley standing at the far wall. They looked tearful and uneasy, but this turned to outright alarm when they saw us. They didn’t say anything, but their eyes swivelled frantically to one side. I followed them, and nearly had a nasty accident.

  Sitting there behind Kelley’s contraption, flanked by two guardsmen, inspecting it as if he owned the place – which he did – was the Emperor himself, still scratching.

  The soldiers remained outside, but the captain clanked in behind us. Rudolph got up, twitching his whiskers in a genial smile, but he didn’t say a word. He sprawled back in Dee’s best chair, and waved to the captain.

  The tinned officer made another of those thunderous throat-clearings, fixed his eyes upon the air above our heads, and recited in a high, singsong voice, ‘Excellencies, your pardon! The morning before last a mysterious missive, in poor German but on fine parchment, was delivered to the High Chancellor by an unknown woman, hooded and cloaked, destined, it was said, for the hand and eye of the Emperor only. In due course the parchment aforesaid did duly reach the Emperor’s sight. Whereupon it was discovered to be entitled The Quickness of the Hand Deceives the Eye, and to treat of the exposure of certain sleights of hand which may be practised upon the credulous, in the guise of sorcery and operations alchemical. Therefore the Emperor thinks it best that to refute such slanders, unfounded though they be, Sir Edward Kelley should once again and at once publicly demonstrate the operation of his most marvellous invention, exactly as before. And to be sure that there is no defect, Master Maxie shall oversee the operation. Will you please inform Sir Edward accordingly?’

  It was a treat to watch the grin wiped off Kelley’s face as Dee translated this, and the blood drain slowly out of his cheeks. ‘Of course, Highness,’ he said hoarsely. ‘In only a day or two – tomorrow, even – I shall be in a position to—’

  ‘Once again!’ snapped the captain. ‘And at once! Here, and now, as His Highness commands!’

  Rudolph just beamed impartially and scratched himself.

  ‘But – but – the materials – the process – it will take time to assemble them—’

  Rudolph raised his eyebrows. The captain tapped Kelley on the chest, sharply. ‘After all the money you have had from His Highness, and all the labours you have told him of, you have not got a store of all you need to hand?’

  When Kelley got that he went pure gorgonzola colour, all pale with blue veins. It matched the pong. ‘Of course, of course,’ he muttered. ‘It is that I have used so much, I may have but a little left—I’ll essay, I’ll essay—’

  ‘His Excellency remembers the process most clearly,’ said the captain. ‘If you like, he will assist you to determine how much remains …’

  ‘No need,’ mumbled Kelley, diving for the cabinets beneath his device. ‘Grateful, grateful – but soon see—’

  By a curious coincidence there seemed to be enough of everything. Kelley protested, Kelley pleaded, Kelley did everything but stand on his head and dance the hula. It looked as if he really was losing his grip. Dee had moved over to stand with the women, holding their hands and looking even more anxious; but he didn’t contribute a word to help Kelley, even when the man appealed to him directly. The more he kept it up, the worse it looked; and at last he seemed to sense this. He shot me one long, smoking glare, but I’d seen a lot worse than that lately. Then, slowly, very slowly, Kelley set to work.

  To be honest, which is a bit of a strain, I wasn’t much happier. It’s one thing preaching confidently about spotting sleight of hand, it’s another having to spot it – first time around, anyhow. You have to watch two hands at once, maybe even feet too – magicians and mediums are often contortionists, and can use their feet nearly as well as their hands. It didn’t help that Kelley insisted on closing the shutters and stoking up a series of hot little braziers at points along his apparatus, whose bright flames threw the rest into shadow. Up and down the tangle of piping and retorts Kelley bustled, pouring in coloured liquids that steamed, powders that fizzed and spat fumes that smelt worse than he did. I was glad he had the servants lay in water-buckets, in this wooden firetrap of a room. Every so often he would throw up his hands in sudden impassioned prayer, and in this religious age everybody’s head bent instinctively – except mine. At other times he hunched, muttering incantations and invocations, squinting over a fire that turned his coarsely handsome features into a lined gargoyle with malevolent glittering eyes. You found yourself watching the eyes, and not the hands.

  I had to admit it was a hell of a good performance, especially for a man who’d been through what he had. He had it down pat, though, and to me it showed; sometimes he moved almost automatically, like a choreographed dancer. His machine was good, too; and that was what worried me most. It was a complex of twisting pipes in brass and copper and cast iron, into which liquids and powders fed from glass retorts, doubling and twisting, going through cooling troughs only to be heated again. The lead was melting in a crucible at one end, and as he tipped it into a funnel mouth, you could actually see its shimmer of heat pass along the pipes.

  No wonder Rudolph had insisted on a demonstration; this was a closed system, and not nearly as easy to gimmick as I’d expected – especially with molten metal. That might mean that the switch would come right at the end, when the tube debouched into the last cooling trough, under the surface of the water. Clouds of steam, the now solid and manageable lead concealed somehow and the pre-melted gold slipped in – that would be perfect. That had to be it.

  I was so sure of that I almost found myself relying on it – until I caught something in Kelley’s expression. A touch, a gleam, it was hard to say what; maybe it was just the furious energy in his features. A chill hit me among all that heat. For all his protestations, he was enjoying himself. Maybe he always had been; that was why he’d overdone the protestations, to sabotage people’s expectations. They’d feel all the worse when he pulled it off. If he was that confident – he must have had the machine prepared for something like this, primed and ready. I would have. And he might just have arranged that obvious cooling trough, too, a plant for anybody suspicious to fasten their attention on. There’s nobody easier to fool than the man who think’s he spotted the trick …

  Which meant that he’d be working the switch with the molten metal,
as nobody would expect he could. So there had to be somewhere else it would come from—

  ‘Ah!’ he shouted, and Rudolph wouldn’t have needed to understand the words to hear the relief and excitement in his voice. ‘By the mass, it’s taken! It’s turned, it flows!’

  I was barely in time. I must have pounced. Everybody jumped, Rudolph included. Kelley was reaching over the machine to feed the last brazier, his hand nowhere near the tubes. It was the other hand, momentarily shielded by his body and the brazier glare, that I swatted away. Rudolph sprang up, Kelley positively screamed and swung at me, as if to knock me all over the apparatus – but the captain, moving with startling speed under all that tin, grabbed his arm and held him, not too easily. He was genuinely foaming at the mouth now.

  ‘You’ve despoiled it, you little whoreson, you son of a punk—’

  I grabbed one of the water buckets and dashed it over that part of the machine. ‘You bet I have, sunshine! You see it, sun – er, Highness?’ I panted, as the steam cleared and the tubes contracted with sudden violent poppings. ‘Where it’s steaming, there, nowhere near the brazier? That’s where he’s just diverted the molten lead, with this sliding bit here! It’s a tap, a spigot! Like a beer keg!’

  It was carefully concealed among the twists of the other piping. I’d never have spotted it if he hadn’t led me to it, but once you knew you could see it stuck out, like an appendix in a digestive system, a dead end to drain something off the main system. A carefully measured something.

  ‘But it steams here also!’ muttered Rudolph dubiously, dabbing nervously at another branch of the piping, also away from the fire. It didn’t occur to me then it was the first time he had actually spoken.

  ‘That’s where he brings the gold in!’ I traced the short iron pipe back, burning my finger in the process. ‘Ow! To this brazier here – there must be a crucible inside, and the gold just flows down once the pipe gets hot enough. If it isn’t, nothing comes through, so you’d never spot it otherwise. And with that shout he expects everyone to be looking at the trough!’