The Book of Fires (23 page)

He nods gravely.

“But I cannot picture this at all,” I say. “It means nothing to imagine the innards of the living earth.”

Mr. Blacklock raises his eyebrows. “Indeed?” he says, scratching his head. “Then consider the earth’s shape to be round like that of a kernel, filled to the skin with minerals and unimaginable liquid fire.”

“But how can I be sure of what you say, sir? These things seem likely when you are describing them, yet . . .”

Mr. Blacklock looks at me intently.

He goes to the study and brings back a book, and shows me on the yellow page the diagrams of little round black balls like walnuts circling the sun on strings. And I pore over them with curiosity, as one would look at marks in the mud on the edge of a pond showing that certain birds had been there, or water rats, or the dogs of poachers, yet somehow not believing in them absolutely.

“I have a thirst for
useful
knowledge, Mr. Blacklock, sir,” I say.

We go on filling gerbes with common stars and silver rain. Later Mr. Blacklock looks at me. “You are right in some ways to raise questions.” He clears his throat. “But you must narrow your eyes and squint into the bright light of the world’s knowledge if you are to advance in understanding what I have to teach you. Do you want to learn from me?” he asks quietly. His dark face is very serious.

I blink at him. “I do, sir.”

“Then sometimes you must accept as fact some things that you cannot verify for yourself entirely.” He gives his head a light tap. “Take that leap forward. Have a trust in some sources.”

“I want to learn, sir,” I say.

And it is true. Lately, the need to know has begun to burn inside me like a small fire.

 

 

Soon after the church clock has struck two that afternoon, at last Cornelius Soul’s painted cart pulls up outside the door.

“Roll brimstone differs from flowers of sulfur,” Mr. Blacklock is saying. “It can be used for making stars, as it lacks the sulfuric acid that is present after sublimation, but it is quite a labor to crush and sift.” I cannot help but glance up expectantly, and Cornelius Soul opens the door and breezes into the workshop. “Can you think of anything particular about the properties of sulfur that should not be ignored, Mr. Soul?” Mr. Blacklock barks.

“It is the yellowest thing I can think of,” Cornelius Soul affirms, and winks at me as he puts a tub of powder on the floor.

I try to contest his flippancy by thinking of something that is yellower. A range of yellow things runs through my head: a buttercup, the yolk of an egg slimy cap fungus, one kind of rowanberry, yellow feathers on goldfinches, wagtails, yellowhammers, the tip of the beak of a dabchick, a grain of ready wheat in summer, various caterpillars and centipedes, half the stripes of wasps, a melted butter sauce, the general sense inside a beepot, the flowers of penny rattle, and then I have it.

“The sun!” I exclaim. I am triumphant. “The sun is yellower! ” I am laughing. “It is so yellow that we cannot even look at it!”

Cornelius Soul pretends to consider this. “Our own luminary,” he says, stroking his jaw as though this could make him think more clearly. His pale stubble rasps. And then he counters, “But we do not know that it is not made entirely out of sulfur anyway!”

He yawns. “You see, we are undone by knowing nothing at last. I like to know nothing.” He pushes at his hair. “Knowing nothing leaves so much space around one, for doing other things. I like a lot of space. I am a big fellow, am I not?” And he winks at me again, a sharp, dirty wink this time that makes my skin prickle with a kind of flush.

Mr. Blacklock stands up. “Sulfur has a bad, eggish smell that worsens upon ignition,” he says crisply. “That is a portion of its ugliness. No doubt you must be done with us now, Mr. Soul. Your schedule for delivery—or should that be deliverance, God help you—must be pressing at this juncture of the day.”

Joe Thomazin sits untwisting some kind of cotton for quick match.

“What is this? ” I ask, holding up a length, to fill the silence when the rumble of Mr. Soul’s cart has faded away.

“Nothing but common cotton, of the kind used as a wick by candle-makers,” Mr. Blacklock says sharply.

I cannot understand what can have made him angry. I wonder why he finds Mr. Soul so vexing; he is too confident, perhaps, too full of life.

“And pay no heed to his licentious filthy tongue,” he adds, but I do not know what he means by that at all.

Mrs. Mellin’s coins inside my stays are yellow, but somehow different. I think of her face reflected tiny on the surface of each coin she handled.

How mild this sunshine is for April, and how late it shines on in the afternoon. My woollen shawl seems almost too warm about my shoulders as I go around the house, but I dare not take it off; it is covering my shape. My bodice is let out to its furthest span, but the ribbons will go no further and soon I fear I must leave off my stays. When that day comes, my condition will be clear to anyone who casts an eye upon me.

“God damn my carelessness!” Mr. Blacklock says suddenly, under his breath, and he sweeps the invoice aside on the dusty desk.

“What is it?” I ask.

“When I made out Mr. Soul’s last order for gunpowder, I failed to calculate for Mr. Torré’s display at St. James’s. As a consequence we have only one box of powder left, which will not be enough.”

“No,” I say. The long list of works needed is pinned up on the wall. “We have not even started on the Roman candles.” Mr. Blacklock begins to scribble on a scrap of paper.

“It is almost four and I have an appointment here with a new client in half an hour that I cannot miss,” he says. He looks about distractedly.

“Joe! Joe Thomazin!” he shouts. “Where is that boy!”

“He is just out, sir, on messages already.”

“Damnation twice!” he says. “There is an urgency to this!”

“Shall I go at once to Mr. Soul’s lodgings and ask for more myself?” I suggest. Mr. Blacklock stands and glowers at the list as if lost in thought, and does not seem to hear me. I begin to speak again.

“Should I—”

“It is hard to say where he may be,” Mr. Blacklock interrupts. “He moves between a number of places, I believe, and I admit I do not have a fixed address for him. He draws his stock from several warehouses, so there is no point in chasing him about the town.” He coughs heavily into his fist. “Most likely he could be found at Child’s, but I am unwilling . . .” He hesitates, clears his throat, then seems to change his mind. “No. You must go there at once and explain our position, or I will not rest easy this afternoon, knowing as I do how low that barrel’s going to be.”

 

The coffeehouse is a fug of smoke and shouting, full of men. Nobody pays any attention to me and I cannot see Cornelius Soul in among them anywhere. The only woman in here is a wan girl listlessly wiping at a table with a cloth, and I go to ask her for his whereabouts.

“Who’s asking?” she says, without interest.

“Mr. Blacklock, Mr. John Blacklock,” I say, and with an effort she slopes to the back of the shop and leans on the jamb. The door is ajar on to the yard.

“Cartright! Housemaid from Blacklock’s here,” she bawls, which makes me bristle. “Wants Cornelius Soul. Wasn’t he here, not long back? Where’d he go again? ”

A man replies but I do not hear it. Then he appears at the door, doing up his breeches.

“He’s up at his mother’s place, wench,” he says, not unkindly, when he sees me standing there. “You know the way to Curtain Court, on the edge of St. Giles?” I listen to the man’s directions with care.

On my way out, a man seated by the door leans forward and studies me closely, as though he has mistaken me for someone else. He is scruffier than the men around him, and has a round, stubbly face. He puts down his long pipe and seems to be about to speak, but I pull my shawl tight about me and do not catch his eye. It is a relief to close the door quickly upon his leery gaze. The sour smell of pipe smoke clings to my clothes for half the walk across the district, and then I forget about him. It is a warm day; I am glad there is no rain.

 

 

The house is thin and shabby, with a peeling front. I knock twice, until a woman’s voice calls, “Will you get that!” and a girl lets me in. A small, neat woman looks up, startled, when she sees a stranger.

“I have a message for Cornelius Soul,” I say.

Her eyes flick to the open door. “From . . . ?”

“From Blacklock’s Pyrotechny.”

“He’s up in the chamber, fixing the casement again,” the woman says. “That rain we had last night—came pouring in.” Her voice is very quiet, so that I have to listen hard to what she says.

“Cornelius!” she calls out softly.

“He’s a good son,” she adds unnecessarily, in almost a whisper. A cat jumps up onto the empty sideboard and licks at its tail.

“Will you sit and wait?” she asks me. “Get up, Nat, and let the girl sit down,” she coaxes, and a little boy squats politely on the ground beside the hearth, though there is no fire lit. He stares at me, winding thread upon a spool.

The woman does not say much but goes on stitching at the man’s coat stretched on her lap. She hums for some time.

The room is plain and clean, though the bad, bitter smell of lye boiling at the soapmaker’s comes in from the street. There is little in the way of chattels, though several garments hang across the crooked beam over the fireplace. She glances up and seems to read my mind.

“The dishes are out at pawn, though no doubt I’ll get them back come wages day.” She fingers the half-stitched lapel. There is a pot of something cold like stew or broth upon the table, with a fatty skin across its surface, and a quartern loaf cut into five.

“Less to wash up once supper is over,” I suggest, and her face breaks into a surprising, crinkled smile, so that her eyes quite disappear.

“You could say that,” she says, in almost a whisper. “One tiny blessing.”

She tugs at her needle.

There is a noise upstairs and Cornelius Soul clatters backward down the ladder, in his shirtsleeves. “All done, Mam,” he says briskly, turning about. “Though that won’t last another season.”

And then he gives a start to see me in the kitchen, as though he has been caught out, and a boyish flush spreads over his face. I get to my feet.

“Your mother has explained what an attentive son you are,” I say. He laughs loudly, as though he thinks that I am mocking him. “Mr. Blacklock needs more stock,” I say. “More gunpowder, and more meal.”

“So many surprises to be had, Miss Trussel,” he replies, recovering quickly, as though from a stumble. “What a long way you have walked to tell me that.”

“It is urgent,” I say.

“I see,” he says, and grins as if he does not believe me. “First light tomorrow, then,” he says, with a dramatic bow.

As I go to the door I have a little rush of courage. “It is delivery we want, not the start of a battle!” I retort, and take my leave. My heart beats in a flutter of panic all the way down the street; sauciness does not come easily to me. Beyond the court and out of sight on Turnmill Street I check my shawl and tuck it again in the way that I have devised to cover my belly properly from view. And by a curious chance I look up to see the man from the coffeehouse who had observed me so steadily. I am sure it is the same man. But though I pass quite close to him he gives no sign of having recognized me, and steps up into the alehouse on the corner.

How warm it is.

I give the meat market a wide berth and come back instead by Snow Hill.

At the house Mr. Blacklock sits inside his study when his new client has gone, and does not come to supper. Mrs. Blight has finished up and taken herself to the Star before we are done with eating, which has stirred up some kind of grumpiness in Mary Spurren quite at odds with the way I feel today.

“Are you unwell?” I ask cheerfully. Perhaps she has her head cold back again. She gets up from the table to see to the pudding.

“Funny ideas you’ve got, Agnes Trussel,” she hisses, unexpectedly. “Don’t you know how to behave in service?”

“What do you mean? ” I say, startled, but she turns back to the hob to lift the pudding from the scalding water and does not hear me, as though anger has stopped up her ears. The steam smells good. I watch her slow fingers fumble with the pudding cloth as she unties it on the plate. I am so hungry I do not care until we finish eating. My swelling belly makes my appetite a monstrous thing.

“Slipping off here and there,” she adds. “Think nobody notices?” The pot she has scrubbed to the point of cruelty gleams on the side.

“But I was taking messages for Mr. Blacklock!” I protest, but she does not reply, and her mood gives a different cast to the remains of the evening. I like it better when Mr. Blacklock eats with us at supper.

What can he be working on that he misses meals so often now? Is it for urgency, or secrecy? Has he found something new? Perhaps I could ask him, I think, but I find I dare not. After all, he might not say.

 

 

Early light floods into the workshop as Mr. Blacklock pins the shutters open the next morning. “I must go down to the timber yard,” he says.

“Why, sir?” I ask.

“Deal sawdust for fiery rains. Mr. Torré plans a volcanic eruption for the display at St. James’s,” he says. “And what Mr. Torré wants, he will have, whatever we may think about it. The sawdust must be deal, for the rosins feed the sparks in the fire.” I nod. I think of putting a pine log on the fire, how it spits and whines, the gummy bubble from the end of its cut limbs. It occurs to me that Mr. Blacklock may be planning something special for this occasion, a new style of firework, perhaps one that does a loop, or shoots out a brilliant star, the like of which has never been seen before in London.

“Shall I come with you, to carry the bags? ” I ask hopefully. Perhaps he might tell me as we walk along.