Alchemist's Apprentice (19 page)

Despite his innate resistance, Jack's mind was beginning to open to the unknown. Every night, surrounded by candles, he sat up late, working his way through Barnstable's library of esoteric texts. Some of them were so old that their pages crumbled as he turned them, and he had to squint and struggle over their faded lettering. Others were fresher, immaculately copied by steady hands and bound between strong covers. It made little difference to Jack; in the end one was as incomprehensible as the next. Some of them seemed to be fables, with metals or chemical substances as the leading characters instead of people. Others consisted of little more than lists of strange symbols, or drawings; the familiar snakes and dragons and lions; or alchemists from different civilizations going through their workshop routines; or series of pictures of what happened inside the sacred vessel. The most common theme, though, was that of the Red King and the White Queen. Jack came across their story in a number of different forms, sometimes illustrated, sometimes not. There were, however, certain elements common to them all. The king and queen were always watched over by Hermes. They emerged from a pool of water or embraced within it. Sometimes they merged into one and became a genderless being, or the small, radiant, Hermes child, and sometimes the child was the offspring of their marriage. The royal pair haunted Jack, reminding him persistently of his failure, embarrassing him by the foolishness of the dreams he had dared to dream and creating a great melancholy within him, stirred by memories of having loved and been rejected. But at times, they did more than that. In the early hours, when the presence of Hermes was at its strongest in the moving shadows cast by the candles, the stories inspired a sense of wonder, a realisation that they spoke of things which had no substance in the actual world, but existed nevertheless within the human soul. In the mornings, in the cold light of logic, these perceptions seemed absurd and he attributed them to tiredness and overwork. But as time went on and the number of similar experiences began to take up more space in his journal, he found that he could not so readily dismiss them. More and more often, his fingers would stray to the little bulge in his waistcoat pocket; his own
prima materia
, waiting to be processed.

It was just a stone, he kept telling himself, just a stone.

One night, early in March, the alchemist brought Jack out beneath a clear sky and showed him how to recognise certain of the planets and constellations.

‘There may not be time to teach you how to measure their positions and work out their auspices,' he said, ‘but it is not so urgent. This I can do for you, but nothing else.'

With the use of the strangest tools Jack had ever seen, Barnstable proceeded to take readings and measurements from things that could barely be seen, way above in the clear sky. It seemed to take forever and Jack grew cold standing there in the frosty grass of the garden. Eventually, when the alchemist was satisfied, they moved back into the house where the fire still glowed brightly.

‘The timing of the Great Work is all-important,' said Barnstable, dropping to his knees beside a pile of charts and almanacs. Jack settled down beside him and watched as, with painstaking care, he drew up a new chart of the stars and checked it off against a bewildering set of tables. By the time he was finished, the fire had burned down to pale ashes and the frost was decorating the inside of the window with spectacular crystalline designs.

‘We have about a month,' said Barnstable. His eyes were brilliant with excitement as he held up the page which contained his final, indecipherable calculations. By contrast, Jack felt his spirit mean and sluggish and full of scepticism. He wondered, not for the first time, how someone could reach Barnstable's age and still appear as innocent as a child.

‘A month for what?' he asked.

‘All attempts to undertake the Great Work must begin under the rule of Aries. The most auspicious conjunction will occur on the third of April.' He grinned gleefully at Jack. ‘Do you feel ready?'

Jack found that he had no answer. He could not say whether he was ready or not, since he still had no clear idea of what would be involved. He shrugged, helplessly.

The alchemist looked disappointed. ‘Perhaps not,' he said. ‘Never mind. There is no sense in rushing things; we'll neither of us be puffers.' He sighed deeply. ‘All things being equal, it will probably be better to wait for another year.'

Jack's hesitancy was washed aside as his spirits rose on a gushing tide. ‘A year!' he said. ‘Oh no. No. I can't wait for another year, whatever it is I have to do. I'll be ready in a month, I'm sure I will!'

‘That's all I needed to know,' said Barnstable, and Jack caught a fleeting glint of the trickster in his eyes before a radiant smile concealed it. ‘It is the sure sign that the work is ready to begin.'

O
VER THE FOLLOWING WEEKS,
Jack worked harder than ever. The alchemist chose certain key documents from his library which he insisted that Jack read or re-read. And although, when he had finished them, Jack could still not claim to understand them, they were at least imprinted upon his mind. There, very gradually they began to create a new template for existence which did not depend upon the world outside but the one inside. Jack's insights were rare and incomplete, but he began to recognise the Red King as representing something within him, certain moods and characteristics. The shining lion resided within him as well, lost in the shadows, waiting to be discovered. The snake lurked in dark waters, dimly perceived, possessed of no understanding beyond its own immediate desires. The White Queen was a painful emptiness, misty and vague, her back perpetually turned towards him. And in the early hours of the morning, when Jack hunched over smoky candles and worked over the texts and drawings again and again, Hermes presided over them all with profound and mischievous wisdom.

The roof blew off the chicken house in a storm, but although Jack offered to take a day off and mend it, the alchemist wouldn't allow it. Instead, he offered the hens the use of the scullery, which they readily accepted. Meanwhile, work in the laboratory intensified. The techniques of extraction and purification that Jack had learnt now had to be put into practice as he prepared the ingredients he would actually use in his own Great Work. Barnstable would tolerate no laxity at all; everything had to be done to perfection if the undertaking was to stand any chance of success. Fires burned throughout the day as Jack refined his materials, then refined them further, and further again. At times his frustration was enormous, but the calm, unyielding presence of the alchemist acted as a constraint upon his impatience and began to forge a new meticulousness within him.

Even so, his perspective on the whole affair remained unstable. He vacillated between intense enthusiasm and bitter cynicism, to the extent that his spirits seemed attached to some gigantic pendulum which swung this way and that beyond his control. The persistent changes from inflation to dejection exhausted him; left him washed out and struggling to continue. The alchemist observed every rise and fall with intense concern, but made no effort at intervention of any kind. He remained humorous but firm, cajoling Jack onwards, containing his fluctuations of mood in his own, inviolate consistency. And, as time went on, Jack began to be aware that the preparations were creating a momentum of their own, as though the Great Work, waiting there in the future, was exerting its own attraction, pulling Jack onwards almost beyond the limits of his endurance. It both frightened and encouraged him. He had become involved in something which seemed infinitely larger than himself, and there was to be no turning back.

The auspicious day arrived much faster than Jack would have wished. He woke before dawn with a sour taste in his mouth and a black dread in his heart. He had slept fitfully and didn't feel rested at all, but no matter how hard he tried he could not retreat into the oblivion of sleep. He turned on to his back and stared into the darkness beneath the ceiling of the loft, searching for a way of escape. It occurred to him that he could just go; slip away and disappear, as he had left London and York-shire. But as though he heard Jack's thoughts, the alchemist stirred on the other side of the wooden partition, sighing and yawning as he always did in the mornings, then laughing and chirruping to himself like a young child as he dressed.

‘Good morning, Jack,' he called through the wall.

‘Good morning.'

‘Remember what day it is?'

‘Christmas,' said Jack, caustically.

Barnstable laughed all the way down the ladder and out into the back yard. Gritting his teeth, Jack abandoned his warm bed and got dressed.

Downstairs, he lit a candle and slumped into a chair. The alchemist came in again, buttoning his flies and shaking the dew from his boots. He perceived Jack's mood immediately.

‘Not feeling terribly optimistic, then?' he said. When Jack made no reply, he continued, ‘Take heart now. Take heart.'

‘I don't know what it is I think I'm doing,' said Jack. ‘I'm not sure what it's all about.'

Barnstable said nothing, but began clearing the ashes from the previous evening in his usual, painstaking manner.

‘I never believed it,' Jack went on. ‘Marley was right all along. It is a sort of madness.'

Barnstable clicked his tongue with mild impatience. ‘Oh, not all that stuff about delusion again, Jack. It's very boring.' He stopped what he was doing and sat back on his heels. ‘Why on earth would you have gone through all this hard work if you didn't intend to see it through?'

Jack made no answer and, after a moment or two, the alchemist said, ‘I think that you do believe it. You may have forgotten for a moment, that's all, just as you forgot about the
prima materia
, even though you had it in your pocket.' He grew reflective, gazing into the empty hearth. The humour and mischief that normally animated his face departed and were replaced by a solemn reverence that Jack had never seen there before.

‘Sometimes I think this art may happen despite us and not because of us,' he said softly. ‘Even I do not claim to understand it in its entirety.'

The candle guttered, appeared to die, then sprang into life again. Jack shivered, knowing against all reason that they were in the presence of Hermes. Barnstable rocked on his heels for a moment, then sighed and straightened up.

‘You are right in one way, though,' he said. ‘You must not expect too much. For every Great Work that succeeds, a thousand fail.'

‘A thousand?'

‘Yes. Or more. I made my first attempts before you were born, but it was not so very long ago that I finally met with success.'

‘You made gold, you mean?'

‘Yes. I made gold.'

‘Then why have I never seen it? Where is it?'

Outside the window, the sky was just beginning to turn from black to deep blue. The alchemist reached for kindling.

‘I think you know the answer to that,' he said. ‘If you don't, you will, in time. But now let's get on and have some breakfast. You have a long day ahead of you.'

When they had eaten, Barnstable went with Jack to the door of the workshop.

‘I'll leave food inside the door for you from time to time,' he said. ‘You need worry about nothing apart from your work, between now and the time it is finished.'

‘Won't you be helping me?' said Jack.

‘Of course not. You have read all you need to read and learned all you need to learn. I would only be in your way. But I shall be nearby if you should get into any trouble. And my thoughts will be with you, night and day.'

‘Night and day? How long will it take, then?'

The alchemist smiled softly. ‘Only you can know that, Jack. You will know, though, you need not worry. Just remember, take your time. Don't be a …'

‘… puffer, I know,' Jack interrupted.

Barnstable laughed delightedly. He ruffled Jack's hair with exuberant affection, then left, closing the door behind him.

Jack stood still and looked around him. He had spent time in the workshop every day for the last six months, but the atmosphere was quite different now that he was facing an indeterminate time there alone. He found that he had no clear idea at all of what he was about to do and he began to wonder if he might not be better to wait for another year, after all. The prospect galvanized him into action. He stepped forward into the workshop and began to gather his thoughts. His own vessel, the one that had been set aside for him more than three years ago, was sitting on the marble surface of the work-table surrounded by the ingredients that he had spent the last weeks preparing for it. Beside the athanor was a good pile of sea coal and charcoal, enough to last for several weeks. Jack hoped that he would not be expected to use it all, nor all the candles which were stacked in a wooden box above it. The prospect of being alone for so long filled him with dread, and provoked in him a necessity for immediate action; anything at all to distract him from the painful thoughts and memories which lurked beneath the surface of his consciousness.

He set to work, carefully laying the makings of a fire in the outer chamber of the athanor. When it was alight, he moved over to the table and began to examine the possibilities. The open neck of his vessel, his philosopher's egg, looked up at him like an eager eye. He was impatient to start filling it, but now that the moment had come, he found himself seized by bewilderment. He had read dozens of lists and formulas in the old books, but all of them had been different. He could not remember even one of them in its entirety. Red sulphur, at least, was common to all of them. He reached for it and, as he did so, he was filled with relief. It didn't matter. Since he didn't believe that he could make gold, he could put whatever he liked into the egg. All he needed to do was to cook it for a reasonable length of time, then declare the work finished and return it to the alchemist. The ordeal would at least be over.