by Rod Duncan
The applause was explosive. When Sal and Fabulo took their bow, the dwarf unbuttoned his shirt and removed the thing that had protected him. Until then, I had felt confident in my understanding of the trick. But when he held it up I saw that his armour consisted of a piece of wood cut to the shape of a heart, in total no bigger than a clenched fist. The remainder of his chest appeared unprotected.
With the show an hour old already there had been no sight of the man whose name it bore. I had resigned myself to disappointment, believing that Timpson’s performing days must have passed. But then the drum roll began again, the audience clapped in time and Silvan planted his feet in the centre of the ring.
“Ladies and gentlemen. For your education and entertainment we have presented some trifling amusements and lesser wonders. But now is the moment you have longed for. It is my honour and pride to introduce the man who you have come to see, whose fame now spans the world, who has seen with his own eyes the wonders of both poles and of the far orient. The man who has dedicated his life to gathering the mystic secrets of arcane sciences. Honoured with a doctorate from the great Peking University of China and a second from the University of Tromso in the icy northlands. And now come to you on his very final tour of the Anglo-Scottish Republic to reveal and demonstrate the ultimate and most hidden science of alchemy. I ask you not to applaud, but to pay your respect through silence in welcome to the great Harry Timpson.”
There is no silence so intense as that generated by a crowd in which each member is holding his breath, and is tensed into stillness for fear of the whisper of the fabric of his clothes. Just such a silence pressed in on my ears as I strained to see over the heads of those in front of me. All were on their feet.
Harry Timpson shuffled slowly from the wings supporting himself with the aid of two walking sticks, each step seeming an effort and made with pain. He wore a dark jacket and trousers and a top hat of modest height. When I had seen him in the wagon I had marvelled at the strange opalescence of his eyes. But now in the clear light of the circus ring, his eyes were concealed beneath a set of brass goggles, the glass of which reflected the torches like two black mirrors, each perfectly round.
Standing in the centre of the ring, he turned slowly, as if searching the audience for a certain face. Only when he had made the full circle, and it seemed the audience might burst for waiting, he began to speak. The resonant quality of his voice that I had first heard in the wagon now filled the expanse of the Big Top.
“The earth and the heavens and everything that resides between are animated by two contending qualities – that of inertia and that of change. Left to itself a pendulum will continue to swing, a fire will continue to burn and every elemental substance will retain its unique essence.”
As Timpson spoke, Sal stepped up to him and set a lit torch to the impresario’s jacket, which instantly sprung into generous flame. The great showman held his arms out to each side so that he resembled a fiery cross. A gasp breathed around the audience, above which Timpson’s voice rang out more powerfully than before.
“It is the destiny of man to intervene, to bend nature to our will, to conquer and change. Thus, a pendulum may be stopped and a fire may be extinguished.” So saying, he ran his hands over the material and where they went, the flames died instantly so that between two heartbeats he stood unharmed and, it seemed safe, though a thick smoke rose from his clothing to join the cloud that hung in the roof of the tent.
“Thus also,” he said, “may base metal may be transformed into gold. But alchemy is not like these other changes. For in this we mutate the essence of things, which is in truth to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, for which crime Adam was expelled from Paradise.
“The achievement and perfection of the alchemic process has been the goal and motivation of my life and work. It was for this that I have travelled the world, accumulating such trifling wonders and arcane knowledge as you have seen tonight, and more beyond that it is not seemly to display.”
Timpson raised one of his sticks and from behind the canvas partition, Sal and the Dutchman emerged, carrying a brazier of glowing coals, their hands protected by leather gloves. Having placed it on the ground next to Timpson, they started working the bellows that I now saw to be attached to each side.
The fire quickly began to roar. The coals turned from dull red to orange and then to white. Next came the dwarf, Fabulo, with a small brick of grey metal, which he carried around the edge of the ring, holding it out for members of the audience to touch and examine. “It’s lead sure enough,” whispered one, who stood close to me.
Timpson poked one of his sticks into the heart of the fire scraping away a layer of coals, revealing the top of a crucible, the lid of which he dislodged. Audience members were being escorted to inspect the brazier now, one of them carrying the small lead brick. Sal used a pair of tongs to take it from the volunteer’s hand and drop it into the crucible. All this happened in plain sight with no possibility of deception.
The ring emptied again. Fabulo was left working the bellows while Timpson addressed the audience.
“The transmutation of lead into gold cannot be accomplished through the power of heat alone. The organic and galvanic forces are required also. This...” He drew a vial of white powder from within his jacket. “...this is the extract of a lichen taken from the fiery crater of Mount Eribus on the Antarctic continent.”
Unstoppering the vial he shook it high over the brazier, sprinkling out a little of the powder. For a moment it seemed that nothing had happened, then the coals began to crackle, glowing green and blue.
“The mixture now stands in flux, poised between two elemental states.”
Whilst Timpson had been speaking, Sal and the Dutchman were hauling a second piece of equipment into position next to the brazier. A shining globe sat atop the contraption, seeming marvellously reflective, though below it were arranged but the cogs, shafts and belts of an ordinary machine. Sal began to turn a handle, setting up a low, keening sound. With him working on one side, the dwarf Fabulo pumping the bellows on the other and the fire between them now sending up green sparks, I realised that my mouth was hanging open. Closing it, I glanced around the audience and saw many similarly entranced by the unearthly scene before us. While we had been staring centre stage, Ellie had gone around extinguishing torches plunging the rest of the space into near darkness.
A bullwhip crack snapped my attention back to the middle of the ring. The audience gasped. There, lit by the eerie glow from the brazier I saw a new wonder. With another percussive release, a shard of lightning jumped from the globe of Sal’s machine into the centre of the fire.
“Faster, my friends!” Timpson commanded.
Sal speeded up his turning of the handle and the keening sound rose to a higher pitch. Fabulo, his brow slick with sweat and reflecting the weird light, pumped faster also, sending up a plume of sparks from the coals.
Crack! Another lightning shard jumped into the fire. Timpson took a second vial of powder and shook it over the machines. The blue-green glow flared brighter, then changed to red and then to yellow. Bathed in this new light, the three men seemed themselves to be transforming into gold.
Crack! The lightning machine discharged again. A fresh cloud of sparks flared up towards the dark canopy above us.
“Now!” Timpson commanded.
Fabulo jumped from the bellows and hauled a casting block from below the brazier. Sal took a pair of tongs and lifted the crucible, the view of which had not been obscured through this whole demonstration. Everyone in the audience craned forwards as he tipped a stream of white hot metal into the block. Timpson produced a large flask of water, which he poured over the glowing metal, sending up a great rush of steam.
Lara and Ellie were ushering more volunteers into the centre of the ring. My decision was made within a fraction of a second. The ring remained dark. There would be a crowd. Ellie and Lara would not notice. I jumped down from my place on the bench, stepped forward and sli
pped in among the other audience members being escorted to inspect the steaming metal bar.
But the torches around the ring were being re-lit. When I finally approached the newly forged gold bar on the ground, I found myself within a circle of bright light.
“Touch it,” said Ellie.
A man on the other side of me bent down and pressed his thumbnail into the metal, leaving a slight dint. “It’s gold sure enough,” he said. “And hot still!”
The audience started to applaud. The crucible lay on its side on the ground next to the gold bar. Gripping my coat, I lowered myself carefully, praying that no one push me. To fall would be to risk revealing my secret. Though my calves were covered by the false trouser legs, my skirt could only be hitched up so high.
Crouching, I reached my hand towards the bar as the others had done, but then shifted sideways and brought it close to the crucible. No water had been poured on that vessel, yet was it cold.
I could not tell if Timpson had seen my tell-tale move or the delicate fingers of my un-gloved hand, for his dark goggles made it impossible to know in which direction he looked. Quickly standing, I joined the other audience members returning to their places. I now knew where the trick of his alchemy must lie.
That crucible was not the one that had been in the fire. Why would he go to the trouble of swapping it unless it held the secret of the trick? There would be a hole in the bottom, through which the melting lead must have run. And hollow walls, containing real gold, poured out through a small hole in the crucible’s lip. Back in Timpson’s windowless wagon the gold bar would doubtless be chopped small and fed back into that secret space within the crucible, ready for the next show.
I skirted the canvas wall behind the benches and was out into the clear night air before the commotion of the volunteers returning to their seats had ended. Behind me, Silvan’s voice boomed out over the excited crowd.
“Ladies and gentlemen. As the final proof of our alchemic process, we will now divide the bar and offer half ounce pieces for one pound each. These you may keep in memory of this great occasion, or may sell at your leisure for their real market value, which is clearly double that amount.”
His words stopped me mid-step, for they had turned my logic upside-down. If the alchemy were merely a trick, there was no way for Harry Timpson to sell the gold at such great loss.
Chapter 20
The alchemist, like the magician’s ingénieur, works behind a veil. The names of neither are known nor are their discoveries published abroad. Yet the product of their imagination may change the balance of the world.
– The Bullet Catcher’s Handbook
Tinker wasn’t the sort of boy to ask where I had been. But Silvan would be sure to question him.
“I’m sorry I got you into trouble,” I said.
He risked a glance at me from under the mop of his hair.
“The day I first arrived,” I said. “The boss dressed you down on account of not keeping watch.”
“I should’ve seen you,” he said
“It was your bad luck. I’m light-footed so you were never going to hear. No one would’ve. But I didn’t want to bring you trouble. Here...” I tossed an apple, which he caught two-handed. The skin was wrinkled, but the flesh would still be sweet.
“For me?”
“For you.”
“Where’d you get it?”
I looked left and right, as if checking that no one was within earshot. “There’s a farm down the road with a shed out back and barrels of apples in straw. That’s what I was doing all this time.”
“For me?”
“Yes,” I lied.
“You did it for me?”
“To say sorry. But you mustn’t tell. I don’t want to be thrown in gaol for thieving.”
The lad seemed thin and hungry, so I expected him to take a bite. Instead he lovingly sniffed the skin then stuffed the apple into the folds of his over-sized coat. “No one never got me a present before.”
They say it is bad luck to speak lies to an innocent. If so I was damned for sure and felt the full weight of my guilty conscience for manipulating Tinker so. The apple had come with me from Sleaford. I’d devised the story to keep him from telling Silvan about my wanderings.
A drum and trumpet under the big top were keeping up a marching beat. No act would follow Harry Timpson’s display of alchemy. I imagined the troop and the animals parading around the ring while Sal or Fabulo snipped up the gold and sold it off to eager jossers.
It was that final twist that still perplexed me. A gimmick crucible could surely create the illusion that I had seen. But no sleight of hand could make it possible for Timpson to sell gold for half its market price.
Tinker had been staring fixedly into the embers of the fire. “I’m glad you came,” he said. It felt like a confession.
“Thank you.”
“I ran away,” he said. “Dada beat me so I ran.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Wasn’t you what beat me.”
“I mean, I’m sorry you had to run. I had to run once.”
“From your dada?”
“From a cruel man who wanted to own me. He was an aristocrat and I ran from his men-at-arms. Over the fields and across the border to get away.”
I looked up from the fire and was surprised to see Tinker staring at me directly, his brow creased with concentration.
“You come across the border?”
“Five years ago. Have you been to the Kingdom?”
“It’s where I’m from.”
“When did you join the troop?”
Tinker bit his lip. Suddenly he was looking anywhere except into my eyes. “Mustn’t speak.”
“Tinker?”
“He told me not to say.”
“You don’t need always to do what Silvan says.”
“Not Silvan.”
“Harry Timpson then?”
The boy shook his head.
“Tinker, look at me. Who are you afraid of?”
“Not afraid...” he began.
But one of the horses snorted and whatever Tinker was about to say, he swallowed. I put a finger to my lips by way of warning. We both waited. A twig snapped in the dark and a moment later Silvan was stepping into the small glow of the fire. Tinker shrunk back into his coat.
“How was the show?” I asked.
“The jossers leave happy,” Silvan said. “And with lighter purses than they brought. But I’ve interrupted. Boy?”
“Boss?”
“What were you speaking of?”
Tinker squirmed.
“He was saying I shouldn’t ask so many questions. I was born with the sin of curiosity.”
“I want to hear it from the boy.”
Tinker nodded vigorously. “Like the lady said.”
“So she’s a lady now? I think not. For she cheats and lies. Did you know that boy? Cheating and lying are the habits of no lady.”
“What lies have I told?”
“You don’t deny cheating at cards?” Silvan asked.
“I’ve cheated in no fair game.”
The music in the big top reached its crescendo and abruptly ended. The buzz of excited voices became suddenly louder as the audience began to emerge.
“I will find you out,” Silvan said. “Boy, get the horses ready for their owners.”
Tinker jumped to his feet. Silvan stared me down for a second before wheeling and marching away.
I had thought that Timpson might sell only a trifling weight of gold. Thus his financial loss could be covered by the box office. To spend in that way would spread his fame. It might be worth it. But mingling with the jossers as they drifted away, I found many eager to show off their spoils. Each clutched a piece clipped from the newly forged bar. Each piece weighing half an ounce or more.
I stood watching the crowds departing down the lane until their distant voices were swallowed by the sound of the wind moving through the bare trees. An unfamiliar doubt nagged at the bac
k of my mind. What would it mean for the world if the trick were not a trick at all?
Chapter 21
Do not allow rules to become a stockade around your imagination. Magic must be beyond any law.
– The Bullet Catcher’s Handbook
It was Sunday morning. Fabulo and three of the minor performers had ridden off to attend mass in Sleaford, a practice tolerated in the Republic. I’d have placed money on Silvan and Timpson being Rationalists. Others in the troop would probably be Christians for weddings and funerals but good Republicans on Ned Ludd day.
By contrast, the Circus of Wonders had been home to a cartload of contrasting beliefs. Christians, Moslems and Jews mixed in with a pinch of witchcraft and a sprig of druidry. Cold rationalism might hold sway in the Republic, as it did in France. But in the Kingdom people boasted of their beliefs and would not discount the superstitions of others. It was not uncommon to see several contrasting religious symbols hanging from the same neck. Better to be safe than sorry.
The winter sun had risen and driven away the mist. In another hour the canvas might dry out. It seemed a perfect day to strike camp. The show had milked the surrounding hamlets dry. The troop ate and drank, consuming money every day, making none. I could not understand why Timpson clung to this pitch. The turf around the gate had already turned to mud.
I wanted to question Tinker, to follow up on our interrupted conversation from the previous night. But Silvan had done a good job of keeping the boy busy on errands and out of my reach.
My morning chores being finished, I sat watching Tania, the fortune-teller. She walked the line of the hedge with a deliberate step, as if she were encircling us with a spell for protection – though what she might fear, I could not guess.
I was the one in danger. For five days I had bunked in Tania’s wagon. Going to sleep each night, I had gripped my knife under the blankets. And each morning I had woken with a start, fearing Silvan might be standing over me.
