Not Less Than Gods (34 page)

“Of course we can, my boy,” said Ludbridge soothingly. “This is their safe house, after all! We’ll take you straight to them in the morning, as soon as you’ve had a rest. For that matter, when was the last time you had a meal?”

“Two days since,” said Matthews, with reluctance.

“Thought so. Bell-Fairfax, poke up the fire and open a tin of potted ham. We’ve got some fresh eggs and a first-rate loaf of bread. We’ll fix you a good old public school fry-up, you’ll see,” said Ludbridge.

“Thou art too kind,” said Matthews, but his mouth was watering. He swallowed hard and watched as Bell-Fairfax fetched out a skillet and fried up eggs with slices of bread and potted ham. The resultant savory mess was presented to Matthews on a plate, with toast liberally smeared with jam, and another shot of vodka. While he ate ravenously, Ludbridge indicated by gestures that Pengrove and Hobson should take themselves off to bed. Though the mechanical leg had stopped sparking, it was still giving an occasional jerk, showing an inclination to work itself across the floor like some sort of grim clockwork toy, and so Pengrove and Hobson were glad enough to leave its vicinity.

When Matthews, sated and blinking sleepily, handed off his plate at last to Bell-Fairfax, Ludbridge pulled out his cigar case.

“May I offer you a smoke, sir?”

“I thank thee, yes.” Matthews took one of Ludbridge’s cigars with his gloved mechanical hand—it seemed to function as smoothly as though it were his original—and accepted a light.

“That’s rather a nicely designed prosthesis,” said Ludbridge, waving the lucifer out. “Better than anything we’ve got, just at present. We can do eyes, of course, and ears, but the mechanics of a limb require a bit more work.”

“They are sensitive mechanisms,” said Matthews, with a rueful look at the floor where his leg had just kicked spasmodically.

“Evidently! Still, I’ve no doubt the Kabinet can repair that one for you. They’re clever chaps.”

“I look forward to meeting them,” said Matthews. “I was sent to warn them of a grave danger.”

“Your fellow Yankees, by any chance?”

“It may be,” said Matthews, as some of his former wariness returned. “I trust I may make my report to them in the morning.”

“Of course you can,” said Ludbridge. “Though you should know that the Franklins have already sent out a general advisory. Oh, don’t worry about the washing-up tonight, Bell-Fairfax! Pour yourself a drink and come sit with us, there’s a good chap. To be truthful, we’ve had a few unfortunate encounters with the filibusters ourselves. They’ve set the bloody Third Section on us, in fact.”

“I am sorry to hear it,” said Matthews, but offered no further details. In the silence that followed, Bell-Fairfax pushed a chair up to the fire and took a seat by them. He helped himself to a glass of vodka and offered more to Matthews, who shook his head and set his own glass aside. Ludbridge blew a smoke ring.

“Look here,” he said in a bland voice. “I know our nations aren’t on the best of terms. All the same, I’ll be the first to admit that George III was a bloody lunatic. The whole business was shockingly mishandled. And we’re all members of one fellowship, after all! We’re all working for the same great day. If you’ve a private report to make to the Kabinet, why then of course it must remain private. But since your countrymen have singled us out for attack, you might do us the courtesy of telling us a little about them, eh? Wouldn’t you say so, Bell-Fairfax?”

“I would, sir,” said Bell-Fairfax, gazing steadily into Matthews’s face. “In order that we might protect ourselves, after all.”

“That’s true,” said Matthew. He sighed. He leaned back tiredly, seeming to have resolved something in his mind. “Very well. I trust that all I tell ye shall be held in the strictest confidence? Listen not as Britons, but as brothers.”

“Fair enough,” said Ludbridge.

“My nation is at war within itself,” said Matthews. “And it stands in peril of its very soul. One pernicious thing caused the very bell to crack
that signaled our freedom from kings and tyranny. Ye know well enough what that thing is.”

“Slavery,” said Bell-Fairfax.

“Aye. It prances like a mocking shadow after all our solemn posturings. All the noblest ideals of Liberty that we profess remain dreams, insubstantial while the negro groans in bondage.

“We should have been, we
must be
a republic of liberty and justice for all. In that alone is our salvation, and toward that end we strive to abolish slavery. But now, a second grinning giant arises to tempt us to damnation.

“He is a doctrine asserting that it is America’s
manifest destiny
to expand—by conquest. To rule over an empire, in the very name of the principles it must betray thereby. The Almighty Himself, this doctrine saith, gave America this divine right, though the tyrants of old claimed to be the Lord’s anointed too.

“To this end the Indian is hunted from his native place and exterminated, but he is not the last victim of this vicious hypocrisy. Nothing less than the whole of the two continents conquered will satisfy it; and the end result will be a vast empire of white slave-holding Americans ruling plantations, living like feudal kings above the grave of that great Experiment on which our nation was founded. We would be a second Rome, greater and more damned.”

Matthews was shaking with emotion. Bell-Fairfax made to pour him another drink, and this time he held out his glass. “Forgive me. I burn so with anger, I may die of it.” He drank again, set his glass aside, and continued:

“This doctrine has its
filibusters
fighting in its cause.” Matthews pronounced the word with a sneer of distaste.

“But how did they come to be shooting at you?” said Ludbridge.

Matthews grimaced and shook his head. “I must tell thee all, I see. One of our brothers in Philadelphia had an apprentice, whom he brought into our ranks. The said boy was gifted beyond genius.
He
devised the means by which I was given back mine arm and leg. He rose through
our ranks too young, on that account. Too soon, and his pride made him foolish.

“He attended a lecture by one of these filibusters, and was filled with the fire of their ambition. He came to us and argued earnestly that we ought to be underwriting the filibusters’ cause; for, he said, ought not all nations be enforced to become Christian republics like our own?

“We reasoned with him, explaining that such an argument itself betrays the spirit of our republic and denies Christ. We may, and ought, persuade other nations by our shining example, but never by force of arms. He grew angry. He broke with us; he went to the filibusters.”

“Good God!” Ludbridge feigned being shocked.

Matthews nodded miserably. “We are quartered in a building Dr. Franklin himself purchased, when he founded the American branch. Mounted above the door of the inmost meeting room is an ancient emblem, given to Dr. Franklin, so it’s said, by thine own branch, before the revolution began. It is the bas-relief head of a lion, enameled in green, and in its jaws it held a disc of pure gold—gold made by alchemy, we were told. More, it was whispered that the disc itself was scribed with the alchemical means for making gold, though in secret and coded phrases and an obscure alphabet.

“Before his desertion, the boy climbed up secretly and wrenched the gold disc free, and took it with him to offer to his new companions.”

“Good God,” repeated Ludbridge. “What a calamity. When did this happen? We can’t have our secrets known, old chap!”

“It happened at the beginning of this year,” said Matthews. “And our secrets will not be known. The boy is dead.”

“Dead, is he? That’s convenient.”

Matthews scowled and reddened. “We are no murderers. He was thrown from his horse, it seems, and killed. Even so, he had had some words with the filibusters, and delivered the golden disc to them. What he revealed to them we do not certainly know; but they are now aware that we exist, and have that which would greatly further their cause, if they could lay hold of it; which is to say, the
technologia
.”

“That’s damned bad.”

“I know.” Matthews took a drag on his cigar. “Well, we managed to find their meeting place, and planted a transmitter. We learned a little of their intention to meddle here, and so a cell was put together to follow their agents and observe them—Lucas, Jenkins and I. We discovered enough to alarm us, in the Holy Land, and we knew we must find out more.

“Lucas, who was a negro, went to them and told a story of having been brought to Bethlehem by his master, who had died of fever there. He offered himself to their service if they would only pay for his passage back to the States. Well, sir, they took him, since they wanted a servant who spoke English. He traveled with them after that to Constantinople. Jenkins and I followed, and he sent us his reports with a transmitter he had concealed in a prayer book. I fear they treated him badly; he was chained in their rooms when they went out, but he endured it for the sake of the mission.

“He learned the whole of their plot, and whence they were bound. He copied their papers and dropped them through a window to Jenkins and I. We bid him escape—it was easily done, for he had a device to cut through steel. He wanted to wait until midnight, but we persuaded him to leave while they had gone out to supper, for we had booked passage on a ship to take us to this city and it was due to sail at half past eight. Would to God we had waited!

“Lucas freed himself and hurried to meet us, where we waited for him near the quay. We saw him, and called to him and waved. He ran toward us. But as he ran we heard shouts of anger, and lo! There were the filibusters, where they had come walking back from their supper. They drew their pistols and fired. Lucas was shot, and he nearly went down, clutching the prayer book that concealed his transmitter.

“When he knew they must overtake him he leaped from the quay, and in midair over the water he destroyed himself, even as I was nearly obliged to do tonight. Himself, his transmitter, and all the goods he carried went up in a rolling flame, no more than a puff of ash upon the wind.”

“A good man,” murmured Ludbridge. Bell-Fairfax’s eyes were wide.

“The best of men,” said Matthews sadly. “Jenkins and I turned to walk away, but they shot at us; we knew then they must have seen us calling to Lucas. We ran. There was a great hue and cry by that time, with the Mussulman police running from all directions to the quay. We ran in the opposite direction. The filibusters came after us still. I can run at great speed, if ungracefully, and so I thought little of it when Jenkins fell behind; but then I saw that he had fallen, and when I turned back to him I saw he had been shot too.

“I tried to pull him up, to carry him, but he bid me remember our orders, and run on; for I had all our machines, hidden on my person. It broke the heart in me but I bid him farewell, and I ran.

“For three days I hid myself, going from place to place, and on the third day I chanced to see a doorway with the sign of the green lion above it, very twin to the one in Philadelphia. I went in and sat, and presently a Mussulman came and asked what I would have. I showed him this.” Matthews stripped off the glove on his right hand, revealing that he wore a signet ring bearing the lion emblem. “I said it was remarkable that his door bore the same sign. He looked grave and, speaking low, exchanged with me the words of recognition.

“He hid me in an upstairs room. I told him my story. He brought me food and coffee and promised to see if anything could be learned of Jenkins.

“Three more days I remained there, and then one morning he told me the Magi had found Jenkins dead, floating in the bay.

“They had determined, too, that the filibusters had departed for this city. I resolved to follow after, for that was my duty. The Magi attempted to convince me otherwise, but when they saw that I was resolute they paid for my passage on the steamer
Sunderland
. Hither I came, desiring to warn the Kabinet of Wonders but mindful of my likely death.

“We were delayed a week at Kronstadt, as our cargo was searched. The
Sunderland
’s captain hid me in a compartment in his cabin. This night he rowed me ashore and left me at the Strelka. I thought it an easy walk across to the Kunstkamera, where I knew the Kabinet might
be found; instead three men came swiftly toward me in the dark, and I recognized the filibusters. The rest ye know.”

“I’m afraid they’ve been waiting for you,” said Ludbridge. “We ran into them in Constantinople, too. The Kabinet have had them watched since we arrived, so that’s something, at least.”

“But how did they know to look for me here?”

“I expect they must have taken your friend alive.”

“Dear God,” said Matthews, slumping.

“All’s not lost,” said Bell-Fairfax. “The Kabinet
are
forewarned, and you’re safe now. Your friends didn’t die in vain.”

“But the Czar himself must be warned! There is more—”

“What more, son?” Ludbridge leaned forward. But Matthews drew himself up, shook his head.

“I think, sir, I’d better wait and make my report to the Kabinet themselves.”

“Just as you like, old fellow, just as you like; but you needn’t worry.” Ludbridge got to his feet. “Bell-Fairfax, fetch a pillow and some blankets from upstairs and move the settee over here by the fire. Anything we ought to do about your leg, for the night, Matthews?”

There wasn’t, and so it was left on the floor until morning. Ludbridge himself carried it the next day when they took Matthews through the tunnel to the Kabinet’s headquarters. Matthews rode in a chair carried by Bell-Fairfax and Hobson, of which image Pengrove couldn’t resist taking a photograph. When Matthews arrived, somewhat red-faced, he was promptly loaned a crutch and escorted off to a private meeting with Nikitin’s senior officer while Matthews’s leg was borne off in the opposite direction to the Kabinet’s fabrication department.

“Meanwhile, we’ve good news for you,” Ludbridge told Nikitin. “We got all your transmitters placed, exactly as you wanted them.”

“I stand ready to assist your chaps in tuning them in,” said Hobson, with a salute.