A Dangerous Energy

by John Whitbourn

  Now he occasionally indulged in a little voyeurism and a few feeble perversions but for the most part was as disinterested as might be expected of a man of his age and time.

  In a world where most people counted themselves fortunate to see their fiftieth birthday, Tobias was a venerable old man. Albeit one who was unusually hale and healthy. That is to say, his body still functioned with moderate efficiency and his intellect flourished entirely undiminished. Everything else, however – energy, hope and curiosity – had gone into the grave before him. The thought that he had lived too long often occurred to him but he knew of no other place to go to and so stubbornly, unhappily, remained.

  Human pursuits offered nothing to poor Tobias in the twilight of his life. A thousand times daily he would look at his pocket-watch and marvel that so little time had elapsed out of a day already made weary by boredom. When all diversions fail, then tedium becomes the final enemy and will, in its victory, make each sluggish moment an agony. An agony, it should be said, made all the worse by its tolerability.

  So, forced at last into inaction, Tobias sat drinking glass after glass of wine while looking out of his window over the audible but invisible sea. From time to time he would hobble round the room or boil a pot of tea over his roaring fire but as the night wore on he got up less often. The reverie he had once sought to escape was now his beloved companion and a blessed release to boot. When it did not come, he would invoke its magical equivalent and thus escape for an hour or so. For a magician to remain long in a magical trance was dangerous, however. Strange things lurked at the edge of reality and it was not entirely unknown for minds resting halfway out of the world to be attacked and suborned. Heedless of this risk, Tobias continued; he thought that a little peace, even if it were that of the grave, was the higher consideration.

  When he was too tired to drink anymore and could think of absolutely nothing else to do, he retired to his bed. Then after an hour or so of restless twisting and turning, he heard a clock downstairs strike four and shortly afterwards fell asleep. Another day of his sixty-third year on Earth was over.

  CHAPTER 13

  In which our hero’s dotage is described with a note on his unusual assistant.

  Grand Master Baxter had died in circumstances of quite impeccable naturalness. Tobias had been the first to discover the body, which was slumped over a desk, head in a vast grimoire. However the rumours this engendered were dispelled by a doctor’s inquest which showed that the Grand Master’s heart had finally and suddenly given up the unequal struggle allotted to it.

  Tobias’ promotion soon followed and in this way he, a mere clerk’s son, reached the very highest position he could reasonably hope for in the profession of his choice. Unlike Baxter who came from even humbler beginnings, Tobias did not immediately embark on a programme of building and spending. This house in which he had lived for nearly fifteen years by that time was quite satisfactory to him, besides which he could not think of anywhere in the Southeast he would rather go. His only celebratory extravagance was a free-spending week in the winehouses and stews of Southwark where he tested his imagination and his kidneys. But even then he did not entirely forget his rôle in life. An Assistant had to be obtained and, as Baxter had done fifteen years before, Tobias caused a stir by attending the annual Thaumaturgic Conference. Unlike Baxter he gained little from listening to the papers given, for they were uniformly pedestrian that year; but as luck would have it he spotted an entirely suitable magician, a young Welshman, to be his acolyte and disciple.

  In this Tobias had been wiser than he knew. While looking for someone who was unobtrusively competent, he found in Father Stratter someone who was not only that but also a shadow version of himself. A battle between inner contradictions raged beneath the young Master of Magic’s detached exterior just as it had once done with Tobias.

  At first he had seemed no different from the other cardboard characters who flitted through Tobias’ life; his unspectacular efficiency seemed to describe him. Then, after about a year, he came to his Master with his first conspiracy theory. On that occasion it concerned a group of suspected Leveller sympathisers in Winchelsea; the evidence seemed reasonable and Tobias allowed him to proceed against them in conjunction with the military authorities. As round-ups went it was conducted moderately and that appeared to be the end of it.

  But Father Stratter returned to Tobias with tales of heretical tendencies amongst certain laity in the Faversham region. The case was sketchy, but he was given the benefit of the doubt and elements of the Holy Office descended upon the unlucky town.

  However, when at reasonably regular intervals Grand Master Oakley was asked to believe that every heresy, forbidden grouping and proscribed organisation was flourishing in his area, he took leave to doubt Stratter’s testimony. In the course of a long discussion he noted the burning look that came into his Assistant’s eyes whenever the persecutions of his making were mentioned. Tobias’ curiosity was aroused and, while he thought the matter out, he postponed the suppression of the alleged Pelagian heretics in Lewes that were Stratter’s latest obsession. Enquiries were made by discreet people whom Tobias retained for such purposes. Yes – an informant had reported some such unorthodoxy in that town but it only concerned one person; admittedly it was a wealthy and highly respected town burgess but still only one person. Stratter had magnified the merest breath of wrong-headedness into the stench of widely ramified corruption. Doubtless further investigation would reveal that his earlier stories of illegality were equally insubstantial.

  Tobias was not particularly worried by this; he had gone beyond being concerned by considerations of Justice or Right. If a few of these stuffy little southern towns were ruffled up and bloodied a bit he, for one, would not protest. So long as the efficiency and general good name of his area was not damaged, he would not intervene.

  What did interest him was Stratter’s motivation for these little crusades. To use him properly, Tobias needed to know which strings made this particular puppet dance. Detailed questions were asked about Stratter’s career and Tobias sought to pry behind the initial glowing references that had prompted him to select the man in the first place. Slowly, but surely, clues began to come in: the testimony of an enemy here, the ugly rumour of a duel there. Tobias wondered if Baxter had trod this path before him and what horrors had been dredged from his own past. The strange thing was that, for the far greater part, the opinions he gathered were warmly approving of his Assistant. He was deemed a good-hearted, kindly and compassionate man. It just seemed that from time to time something bitter within him spiralled up and struck out blindly at the world.

  Not unnaturally, Tobias thought unpredictability a dangerous quality and for a while he kept a close watch on his aide. Although the external enquiries ceased, Cormac (not an unintelligent man for all his brutality) was detailed to monitor Stratter’s every move and discreetly canvass household opinion on him. With the exception of one senior servant, embittered by mankind beyond hope, everybody had the highest praise for the newcomer. He was described as ‘courteous’, ‘considerate’, ‘kindly’, even ‘pious’. It came to Tobias’ ears that he performed good works in the village and distributed a secret dole to some of the poorest families. Inevitably, therefore, it was not long before he became a well-loved figure in the area and the object of loyalty and admiration in his Master’s house.

  This was all in great contrast to the public image of ‘that restless spider in the big house’, as the Squire of Pevensey called Tobias. But as Grand Master, he was not jealous. And Stratter’s work was impeccable; perhaps too good, even, for it left his Master with little to do. Therefore, caring not a fig for the threat to his charges, Tobias found he had no reason for complaint or disquiet. Presumably, something had filled Stratter with violence, but Tobias did not consider this a matter for his concern.

  And so he soon instructed Cormac to leave the young assistant alone and a letter was despatched calling down the wrath of Church and State on the Pela
gians of Lewes.

  Predictably, new offenders were found to replace them and as time went on a long list of heresies was unearthed. Albigensians, Waldenses, Bulgars, Lollards, Hussites, Arianists, Donatists – and may other footnotes of history – were revived for Stratter’s expiations. Tobias only intervened when he thought the credulity of higher authorities risked strain or one bloodbath followed too closely on another. He had a tool who could find the energy to punish the world for his existence where Tobias could not. In this spectacle the Grand Master found the last satisfaction that life had to offer him. Without the bother of having to train him. Tobias had found himself an heir apparent to carry on his own traditions.

  To all intents and purposes Tobias’ time was already over. He could not remember whether either magic or power had been the love of his life at the beginning. Later on, of course, they had become irretrievably mixed; but now the love was dead. Deprived of this justification his life was an empty shell and just as sterile.

  After a fitful sleep he would rise late. While one of his Irish guards stood by, a servant would dress him and then breakfast would be brought into his room. As often as not he would merely toy with the food or send it back untouched. On alternate days there would be a newspaper fetched from the village for him to try and read, otherwise he would shuffle off to his study and pretend to work. No less a personage than the Grand Master of London, England’s senior magician, had suggested to him by letter that he should put down his lifetime’s experience of the demonological art – a field in which he was ‘our foremost expert’ – into a book. This would be published by the Church and used as a guide for magicians of all ranks and would ‘finally secure a position in posterity’ for him.

  From such a person, requests were barely distinguishable from commands and Tobias felt obliged to comply with the suggestion. Yet, as in everything else, his heart was not in it. He had seen the ultimate end of demonology and had seen that there was no point to it. Even so, he tried his best and worked hard to collect his memories into a form palatable to the Church. News of the project spread and expectations were high. Yet all that Tobias’ executors found were a few sheafs of unconnected, rambling and, in places, enigmatic notes. A rumour spread that the long-awaited exposition on Demons had been destroyed or suppressed by Church authorities because of its scandalous and disturbing content. As rumours go, this was quite entertaining and entered the annals of popular myth but, alas, it was not the truth.

  The truth was that Tobias had simply not got the work in him anymore. Innumerable times he would sit at his desk, write a few sentences, perhaps pen a diagram, and then his mind would go blank. Thus blocked he would go and drink some wine, stare out over the sea and then force himself to return to his ‘book’. By that time his mind had lightly moved on to other fields, other times, and the next thing he wrote would be entirely unconnected with the subject matter preceding it.

  No one knew of the countless times he consigned the whole manuscript to the flames and resolved to start again. But whatever he did, it always turned out the same; the book was never written and his hard-won experience was lost.

  On most days he would give up the self-deluding struggle around midday and go to the dining room for some lunch. In the afternoons he would confer with Stratter or write up his weekly returns (one task he could complete by force of habit). But otherwise he would wander; he hated it but some restlessness kept him on the move. Round the house he would go, time after time, with his old man’s shuffle – having furniture rearranged, finding fault with the servants, trying to catch out Cormac’s security arrangements and a host of other pointless, time-killing, activities.

  His temper was ever more uncertain now and, aside from his Irishmen and Father Stratter, his household assiduously avoided him. Usually he found himself pacing a long corridor, quite alone and entirely out of the sight and sound of men. Sometimes he grew so bored with this that he even returned to ‘work on his book’ which meant more wine-drinking and sea-watching. If the sun was not too bright he occasionally varied this routine by venturing along the beach. His coach was kept ready should he wish to depart to more distant places.

  Outside of the house his Irish guards accompanied him at all times, partly for reasons of security and partly in answer to his pathetic desire for company. In a world where religion and politics were abrasive callings and where circumstances could change suddenly, his mercenaries were his eyes and ears, sword and shield. He had chosen Irish guards because they were familiar with his culture but not part of it, and he paid them excessively enough to make them loyal and incurious. Cormac, their clan leader, was something of an amateur philosopher and theologian, although he did not allow this to affect his actions, and it was with him, during those interminable afternoon wanderings that Tobias had his last real conversations. Everyone else came for orders or with petitions but cold, hard Cormac was prepared to talk – so long as his salary continued to be paid.

  All things pass and at last, around 6.00 p.m., Tobias would have his dinner which he pecked and worried. Then when he could spin this out no more he retired to his private room to endure the sort of evening and night already described.

  Barely able to endure his plight, unable when he most needed it, to summon up any remaining will to change it Tobias carried on wearily, hoping for anything that might force change upon him.

  In his heart he knew that there was only one thing, now, that would bring release to him. But when every single other hope was dead he continued, against all evidence, to hope that another solution would reveal itself to him. Thus in fighting off resignation this dying ember of hope became one of his major torments. Like a ghost doomed to fruitless quest, Tobias was unable to find peace because, now in his extremity, he lacked the capability to even look for that which he sought. Nor would it come to him save in one, unpalatable, form.

  He lived on.

  CHAPTER 14–2026 AD

  In which our hero goes on a day’s holiday.

  The clock struck ten a.m.; it was a cold wintry morning. Tobias considered staying in bed where he was at least moderately warm. Why not? Give it a try, he thought. So there he lay, staring at the panelled ceiling. After a while a servant appeared carrying breakfast but was dismissed before he even fully got in the room. Silence swiftly returned and he endured an hour or so of thinking of nothing before it became unbearable and he was about his wandering again.

  He rang for a servant and ordered outdoor clothes to be set out. With the servant arrived an Irishman and he was told to get the coach ready along with four of his number. Tobias had decided that today would be a holiday from work or, more accurately, from the guilt inspired by an inability to work.

  He dressed in a heavy gown, topped this with a sturdy overcoat and ordered a large hip-flask to be filled with brandy. Then, suitably clothed and provided for, he was helped downstairs and into the waiting coach. Cormac and three brooding companions were on top and Maxted, taciturn coachman to successive Grand Masters for thirty years, completed the outing’s personnel.

  In an effort to spin any recreation out as long as possible, Tobias deliberately did not hurry. They stopped along the coast road and venturing out, Tobias hobbled along the beach a little way. Exhausted by this he stopped and looked out to sea for a long while – it was much the same as seen from his study window he thought – evil and brooding. A bore.

  Cormac and his compatriots waited patiently saying hardly a word; they were more than used to this and nothing the old man could do would surprise them anymore. After a while he came back and one of them leapt down to help him in. A blanket was draped round his knees, the door secured and at length he tapped the roof with his stick as a signal to move on.

  Throughout the remainder of the morning and most of the afternoon the little group trundled around the area. In most of the nearby villages his name and reputation were well known and his passage attracted no welcoming glances. Tobias knew full well that children were being called in, doors shut and c
urses spoken even as he arrived. It made him hate them all a little bit more but on the whole he didn’t care. The ever-vigilant Cormac was on top; he would make a note of the more obvious signs of hostility and these could be brought to Stratter’s attention. Tobias considered their enmity unjust; he had done nothing to harm these yokels. Their objections were based on his irregular and withdrawn lifestyle which was none of their petty-minded business. Stratter’s attentions would be their just punishment.

  In fact he was not entirely incorrect in his assumptions. The farmers and fisherfolk of the surrounding countryside hated his name because of his perverse sexual life and had no way of knowing that the widespread rumour claiming that Black Magic was practised at the big house were baseless.

  And so, an unwelcome visitor in the dwellings of man, he moved on with no particular route. From time to time he would spot some natural feature or view that seemed interesting and, stopping the coach, he would be helped out to gaze and pace in silence. In every case however, it was not long before his attention wandered and his old feet were forced to do likewise. By mid-afternoon Tobias thought himself incapable of looking at another natural feature and gave the order to set off home. On the way they stopped at an inn for refreshment; a bottle of wine and some lamb cutlets were brought to him in his coach. He drank and ate but could taste nothing and soon gave up. His guards and coachman, however, ate heartily – as well they might, for it was at his expense. As he sat there he could hear them happily chomping and chewing away and momentarily hated them for their zest. Because of this he hammered on the roof to move on and the merry repast on the coach roof was curtailed.