Stone's Fall

by Iain Pears

  It made me think, though, and as I walked across the Piazza San Marco, I ran through all the possibilities in my mind.

  I stopped, and smiled happily at a group of urchins throwing stones at a washing line, seeing if they could knock a sparrow off it. That was it, of course. The only problem was how to organise it.

  CHAPTER 12

  Anyone reading this might be surprised that I was not more concerned at Ambrosian’s assertion that Macintyre was some sort of crook. Often enough such characteristics are something of an impediment to good business. But not always, and not if the scoundrel is in no position to do you harm. I had not the slightest intention of giving Macintyre any money in a manner I could not control. He could not abscond with what he did not have. Besides, such people can be useful, if they are working for you, rather than against you. The past life of Xanthos, for example, is not something I would wish to know too much about—although when he came knocking at my door I did discover that it would be unwise ever to send him anywhere controlled by the Sultan, as it would be a long time before he would be let out of gaol. But now his devious skills are employed to my advantage, and he has been a good and loyal employee, up until recently.

  So Ambrosian’s beliefs about Macintyre did not worry me much. But it would be wrong to say I was not intrigued, and I was impatient that my dear friend Cardano, to whom I had written some time previously, had not yet replied. Until he did, there was very little I could do. I could find old newspapers in Venice, some basic reference books, but little more; the sort of information I required could only be found in the dining rooms and boardrooms of the City of London, and then it would be available only to those who knew how to ask.

  So I had to wait, and become a proper tourist for once, and indulge my ever-growing passion. Four more days, in fact, before the letter finally reached me—wonderful days, spent in the autumnal warmth, and often enough with Louise, for the more rendezvous I had with her the more I wanted. After the events at the Marchesa’s salon, we threw off all caution and discretion. I began buying her presents, we walked together in the city, were seen together. It made me proud and uncomfortable at the same time—I once had to tell her to be more discreet with her husband.

  “I will leave him now, because of you. Now I know what it is really to love someone, I cannot stay anymore. We can be together forever, then,” she said, turning to look me in the eyes. “We can be like this forever. Just you and me.”

  “What about your son?”

  She made a gesture of disgust. “He can have him. He is not my child; I merely bore him. There is nothing of me in him at all. He will be like his father; weak, useless.”

  “He’s only four.” She had spoken with a harshness I had never heard in her before. There was real cruelty in her words and they disturbed me.

  I must have reacted, for she instantly changed. “Oh, I love him, of course I do. But I am no good for him. I don’t understand him.”

  Then she put her arms around me once more, and changed the subject totally for an hour. But I left our rooms with an uneasy feeling that afternoon; it faded soon enough, but did not disappear entirely.

  It also changed the way we were together; Louise did not refer to leaving her husband again, but more and more often the conversation came round to her desire to be with me. I could understand why her life was hellish, and why she so desperately sought a means of escaping. When I considered the weals and cuts, Cort’s behaviour at the séance, his hallucinations, the indignities and humiliations she endured when no one was there to see, it was hardly surprising she clung to me.

  And I was besotted with her. So why did I not leap at the chance to capture her forever? It could have been done. A separation of some sort from my wife was possible, messy and unpleasant though it might be. But Louise and Venice were linked too closely together. Love and city were intermingled; I could not imagine one without the other, and I think my hesitations and doubts were linked to my sluggish awareness of my growing immobility. The Marchesa was right; Venice was like an octopus, which slowly and stealthily entangled the unwary in its tentacles until it was too late. Longman would never leave; Cort might not either; in other Englishmen I met in that period I learned to recognise the slightly vacant look of the entranced, the people hypnotised by the light, who had lost their willpower, voluntarily given it up, like the followers of Odysseus on the island of the lotos-eaters.

  They did not enter a state of bliss by so doing; Venice does not offer happiness in exchange for servitude. The opposite, rather: melancholy and sadness are its gifts; it allows the sufferers to be all too aware of their lassitude and inability to leave. It taunts them with their weakness, but still will not let them go.

  Some were immune; Drennan seemed unaffected, for example. Nor did it have any effect on Macintyre, because he scarcely knew where he was. For him Venice was merely the place where his workshop was; he had sacrificed his will to his machinery already; there was nothing for the city to take.

  And some were driven into madness. Cort deteriorated rapidly after his explosion at the séance; I saw little enough of him, indeed I tried to avoid him, but could not but notice how he looked more haggard by the day, heard reports that he was receiving visitations from his phantom more often. He worked obsessively, but got nothing done; until then he had actually been making progress. Macintyre’s internal buttressing was all but complete. But now most of his workforce abandoned him as his behaviour became so erratic they did not want to come near him. So he worked alone, furiously making drawings that no one would execute, ordering materials that lay in the courtyard untouched until he sent them back and began an argument with the supplier.

  “Is Cort insane?” I asked Marangoni. I fully anticipated his reply, and was astonished by what he in fact said.

  “Well, do you know,” the doctor replied in his heavy accent, putting the tips of his fingers together to look more professional, “I do not think he is. Unbalanced, certainly. But I do not think he is insane. His mother’s name was Annabelle,” he said, in total breach of the normal notions of discretion. “She died when he was born, and he worships her memory. The idea that she was displeased with him shook him to the core. He told me this a couple of days ago.”

  “You’re still seeing him?”

  “Oh, yes. It is vital considering his state of mind. He was in the hospital for the better part of a week, and I thought it a good idea to get him to come for a regular chat. He finds it peaceful just to sit in the sun looking at the lagoon, undisturbed. He goes away calm and contented. Normally. Sometimes we find him a bed here. We have a guesthouse, you know. A strange arrangement, but the monks were very hospitable, and for some reason we keep up the tradition.”

  “Have you worked out what happened at the séance? Do you think the Marchesa did it deliberately?”

  “I’m sure she is entirely genuine in her beliefs,” he said with an indulgent smile at the foolishness of women unaccustomed to the rigours of the scientific method. “The trouble is she is in many ways a very stupid woman. She will hear something then forget it entirely. She has a very poor memory. But it remains in her mind, and when it pops up again, she believes it is a spirit which has told her. I’m sure she was told that Cort’s mother’s name was Annabelle, but forgot it. Then it came back to her.”

  “You seem to think he will recover.”

  Marangoni shrugged. “That depends on what you mean by recovery, of course. If all matters which might disturb him were removed, I dare say he would soldier on. The trouble is that this is unlikely. He should return to England immediately. If he stays here, then perhaps not.”

  “But is he safe? His behaviour—”

  “—is the behaviour of a madman. I grant you that. But does that mean he is insane? I have already told you how many people—women especially—are mad while showing none of the symptoms of madness. So we must equally consider the possibility that someone who behaves as though he were mad might, in fact, not be.” He smiled.

&n
bsp; I stared, quite uncomprehendingly, at him.

  “Perhaps his behaviour is a perfectly reasonable response to his current situation,” Marangoni suggested quietly. I knew exactly what he meant.

  “He stabbed his wife with a knife. Are you telling me she deserved it?”

  “Oh no. I very much doubt anyone deserves to be stabbed. He may—at that particular moment—have considered she deserved it; that by striking at her, he was warding off the torments he was experiencing. Of course, this was heightened by the drugs.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, you people!” he said with exasperation. “You really notice nothing, do you? Did you not see the glassy eyes, the sweating, the slurred expressions, the way his movements became more uncontrolled and exaggerated?”

  “I thought he’d been drinking.”

  “He drank nothing but water. Opium, my dear Stone. Classic symptoms.”

  “Cort is an opium addict?”

  “Dear me, no. But he had undoubtedly consumed some of the drug shortly before he arrived. It is easy enough to come by. You can buy it in most pharmacies.”

  “He told you this?”

  “No. He denied it absolutely. Nevertheless, he was certainly under its influence.”

  “So, he’s lying. Perhaps he is ashamed.”

  “Perhaps he was unaware of it,” Marangoni said absently. “Not that it matters. He will get no more of it while he is in my care.”

  “What do you think of Marangoni?” I asked when I next saw Louise.

  “Ugh, disgusting,” was her reply. “Do you know, he tried to seduce me, that dirty little man? I was so ashamed, I have never told a soul. But you I can tell. I know you will not hold it against me. Just don’t listen to anything he says about me; I’m sure it would be nasty and cruel.”

  “Of course not,” I said. “Why should I, when I seduced you myself?”

  “But with you I wanted to be seduced,” she said. “I would sacrifice anything for you. I even accept,” she said, her voice trembling, “that you will sacrifice nothing for me.”

  “But you know…”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said with a sigh, looking away from me. “I will be your mistress and one day you will leave me. It is enough.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “But it’s true. You know it is. And when you do leave me, I will kill myself.”

  She said it seriously, and looked steadily at me as she spoke.

  “Why would I want to live without you? To spend the rest of my life with a disgusting husband and a snivelling child, to be tormented day and night by them? If only I could be free of them! All I have that is worthwhile is you.”

  “That cannot be true.”

  “Oh, believe that, then,” she said, turning away. “Believe that, then you will be able to leave me with a clear conscience. I do not wish you to suffer as well. You do not love me, I know. Not really.”

  “But I do.”

  Then prove it. She did not say these words; she did not need to.

  CHAPTER 13

  Two days after this encounter, Cardano’s letter—his first letter, I should say—arrived, and the last piece of my plan took place. His news explained much; after the normal sort of chatter about the markets, he got onto the subject of Mr. Macintyre. Here his information was surprising. I had asked whether anything was known about Macintyre’s reputation. This was not the sort of thing that a man like Cardano would know, but it was easy enough to discover. I thought I would hear merely that Macintyre was a decent, competent, well-respected engineer of skill. Until my interview with Ambrosian I had expected nothing more.

  Cardano’s letter was very much more informative than that, however.

  Fortunately, the annual meeting of Laird’s took place yesterday afternoon, and I went to it; I have some shares in the company (so do you, if you recall). Normally these meetings are worse than useless, but it is good to show one’s face occasionally. I asked Mr. Joseph Benson, the general manager, about your Mr. Macintyre and got a most surprising response. He looked rather shocked, and disturbed that I should mention the name. Why was I asking? What had I heard? He was very worried indeed.

  I found this perplexing, of course, and kept at him until he was sufficiently reassured to tell me the entire tale—one which you had best keep to yourself.

  Macintyre was extraordinarily able, and remarkably pigheaded, it seems. He would never listen to advice, constantly having disputes with anyone who disagreed with him, and was, all in all, well-nigh impossible to work with. It seems he was always coming up with novel ideas, and would work on them in the company’s time, using the material and resources which should have been used for something else.

  That is beside the point, which is that he was a man who could turn his hand to any engineering problem. If there was anything which defeated all others, Macintyre would be called in, and would find the solution. He was, in other words, both impossible and indispensable at the same time. I do not know if you remember the Alabama? It was a Laird’s ship which ended up in Confederate hands. As it caused a great deal of damage to Northern shipping, the Yankees were extremely angry about it, and are still trying to blame Laird’s and the British Government. Laird’s maintain it was nothing to do with them; they sold the ship in good faith, and could hardly have guessed it was going to be fitted out with weapons by the owners, then sold to the Confederates…

  Except that the man who fitted the ship out was your Mr. Macintyre, who was—until he vanished from the face of the earth—living proof of Laird’s complicity. Or should I say duplicity? It doesn’t matter. In order to avoid recriminations, he was given a large amount of money and told to make himself scarce. When asked, Laird’s now say officially that he disappeared a few years ago and stole money before he left. They are as angry at him as anyone else, and in public demand his arrest and return…

  I found all this fascinating, and at least it explained how the story of dishonesty had come to hang over Macintyre’s reputation. The story of the Alabama is little known now, but it had a certain currency in its day; a wooden-hulled, thousand-ton barque, commissioned by the Confederacy in 1861. The Unionists heard of the purchase and tried to stop it. Laird’s was caught between its customer and the wishes—however reluctant—of the British Government to maintain a strict neutrality in the terrible Civil War.

  Strict, but in my opinion, foolish, for the refusal of Britain to allow its industry to supply both sides led to the Americans supplying themselves, and thus building up the industries which now challenge our own. A more enlightened policy would have supplied both evenhandedly, thus draining the United States of gold, and shackling their industry; with a little wisdom and ruthlessness Britain could readily have reestablished its predominant interest on that continent, and been ready to congratulate whichever side emerged victorious.

  But the moralists triumphed, and from that triumph will come, eventually, the eclipse of Britain’s industrial might. Be that as it may, Laird’s (which was in need of commissions) found a way around the problem by using some other company as a go-between. How could we prevent our client reequipping the vessel and selling it on? they asked when the matter was raised in Parliament. We build ships, we do not oversee their use as well.

  A clever move but one which the victorious Unionists would not accept; they began to pursue Britain for liability for losses caused by the ship, and only settled the matter sometime after I returned to England from Venice. The Government and the insurance companies eventually paid out some four million pounds—for by the time she was caught off France in 1864, the Alabama had sunk a fearsome amount of Unionist shipping. But in 1867 the Americans (a people prone to extravagance in both speech and action) were insisting that anything less than two thousand million pounds compensation would be an insult to their national pride, and threatening all manner of reprisals if they didn’t get it.

  I was thrust into Macintyre’s company once more a few days after I received this interesting sidelin
e on his past life, when he invited me to come along for the first real test of his torpedo. I was highly honoured; no other Englishperson was even told this great moment in his life was taking place, but I had suggested that he try it out secretly first of all, rather than with the bankers there. What if you try it and there is some small hitch? That could ruin everything, I suggested. Best to have a test run away from prying eyes. If all goes well, then you can repeat the experiment in front of the bankers. It was good advice, and he realised it. The date was set, and I was—rather shyly—invited. I was touched by the gesture.

  So, one cold morning a few days later, I found myself on a wooden barge, wrapped up warmly against the mist which hung over the lagoon like a depressing shroud. We were far away from land, to the north of the city, with a couple of his workmen for company. The barge owner had been told he was not wanted, and the previous evening the torpedo had been loaded in secret onto the deck and covered with tarpaulins.

  It was a sailing barge, and there was a flurry of anxiety that there wasn’t going to be enough wind, but eventually, at half past four in the morning, the bargee declared that we could go, and we set off—very slowly indeed, the boat creeping along at such a pace that an hour later we were still just off the Salute. By six we were in the dead waters north of Murano, where the lagoon was shallow and few boats, only those with the most shallow of draughts, ever ventured. It was a magical experience in a way: to sit in the prow of the vessel smoking a cigar as the sun rose, and wild ducks flew low over the marshes, seeing Torcello in the distance with its great ruined tower, and far away the occasional sail—red or yellow—of one of the sailing ships that endlessly crisscrossed the lagoon.

  Macintyre was not the best company, continually fussing over his invention, unscrewing panels and peering inside with an old oil lamp held over him by Bartoli so he could see what he was doing. Adding a little oil here, tightening a bolt there, tapping an instrument and grumbling under his breath.