Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
“Her husband, is it? Well, then I shall raise him up to some lofty position! I shall make him much greater than any thing he could achieve by his own efforts. He shall be Prime Minister. Or Emperor of Great Britain perhaps? Will that suit you?”
“No, no!” cried Mr Norrell. “You do not understand! I merely want him to be pleased with me and to talk to the other Ministers and to persuade them of the great good that my magic can do the country!”
“It is entirely mysterious to me,” declared the person in the window, haughtily, “why you should prefer the help of this person to mine! What does he know of magic? Nothing! I can teach you to raise up mountains and crush your enemies beneath them! I can make the clouds sing at your approach. I can make it spring when you arrive and winter when you leave. I can …”
“Oh, yes! And all you want in return is to shackle English magic to your whims! You will steal Englishmen and women away from their homes and make England a place fit only for your degenerate race! The price of your help is too high for me!”
The person in the window did not reply directly to these accusations. Instead a candlestick suddenly leapt from its place on a little table and flew across the room, shattering a mirror on the opposite wall and a little china bust of Thomas Lanchester.
Then all was quiet.
Mr Norrell sat in a state of fright and trembling. He looked down at the books spread out upon his desk, but if he read, then it was in a fashion known only to magicians, for his eye did not travel over the page. After an interval of several minutes he looked up again. The person reflected in the window was gone.
Everyone’s plans concerning Lady Pole came to nothing. The marriage – which for a few short weeks had seemed to promise so much to both partners – lapsed into indifference and silence upon her part and into anxiety and misery upon his. Far from becoming a leader of the fashionable world, she declined to go any where. No one visited her and the fashionable world very soon forgot her.
The servants at Harley-street grew reluctant to enter the room where she sat, though none of them could have said why. The truth was that there hung about her the faintest echo of a bell. A chill wind seemed to blow upon her from far away and caused any one who came near her to shiver. So she sat, hour after hour, wrapped in her shawl, neither moving nor speaking, and bad dreams and shadows gathered about her.
19
The Peep-O’Day-Boys
February 1808
Curiously, no one noticed that the strange malady that afflicted her ladyship was to a precision the same as that which afflicted Stephen Black. He too complained of feeling tired and cold, and on the rare occasions that either of them said any thing, they both spoke in a low, exhausted manner.
But perhaps it was not so curious. The different styles of life of a lady and a butler tend to obscure any similarities in their situations. A butler has his work and must do it. Unlike Lady Pole, Stephen was not suffered to sit idly by the window, hour after hour, without speaking. Symptoms that were raised to the dignity of an illness in Lady Pole were dismissed as mere low spirits in Stephen.
John Longridge, the cook at Harley-street, had suffered from low spirits for more than thirty years, and he was quick to welcome Stephen as a newcomer to the freemasonry of melancholy. He seemed glad, poor fellow, of a companion in woe. In the evenings when Stephen would sit at the kitchen table with his head buried in his hands, John Longridge would come and sit down on the other side of the table, and begin commiserating with him.
“I condole with you, sir, indeed I do. Low spirits, Mr Black, are the very worst torment that a man can be afflicted with. Sometimes it seems to me that all of London resembles nothing so much as cold pease porridge, both in colour and consistency. I see people with cold-pease-porridge faces and cold-pease-porridge hands walking down cold-pease-porridge streets. Ah, me! How bad I feel then! The very sun up in the sky is cold and grey and porridge-y, and has no power to warm me. Do you often feel chilled, sir?” John Longridge would lay his hand upon Stephen’s hand. “Ah, Mr Black, sir,” he would say, “you are cold as the tomb.”
Stephen felt he was like a person sleepwalking. He did not live any more; he only dreamed. He dreamed of the house in Harley-street and of the other servants. He dreamed of his work and his friends and of Mrs Brandy. Sometimes he dreamed of things that were very strange – things that he knew, in some small, chilly, far-off part of himself, ought not to be. He might be walking along a hallway or up the stairs in the house in Harley-street and he would turn and see other hallways and staircases leading off into the distance – hallways and staircases which did not belong there. It would be as if the house in Harley-street had accidentally got lodged inside a much larger and more ancient edifice. The passageways would be stone-vaulted and full of dust and shadows. The stairs and floors would be so worn and uneven that they would more resemble stones found in nature than architecture. But the strangest thing of all about these ghostly halls was that they would be quite familiar to Stephen. He did not understand why or how, but he would catch himself thinking, “Yes, just beyond that corner is the Eastern Armoury.” Or, “Those stairs lead to the Disemboweller’s Tower.”
Whenever he saw these passageways or, as he sometimes did, sensed their presence without actually perceiving them, then he would feel a little more lively, a little more like his old self. Whatever part of him it was that had frozen up (his soul? his heart?) unfroze itself the merest hair’s breadth and thought, curiosity and feeling began to pulse again within him. But for the rest nothing amused him; nothing satisfied him. All was shadows, emptiness, echoes and dust.
Sometimes his restless spirit would cause him to go on long, solitary wanders through the dark winter streets around Mayfair and Piccadilly. On one such evening in late February he found himself outside Mr Wharton’s coffee-house in Oxford-street. It was a place he knew well. The upper-room was home to the Peep-O’Day-Boys, a club for the grander sort of male servants in London’s grand houses. Lord Castlereagh’s valet was a notable member; the Duke of Portland’s coachman was another and so was Stephen. The Peep-O’Day-Boys met upon the third Tuesday of every month and enjoyed the same pleasures as the members of any other London club – they drank and ate, gambled, talked politics and gossiped about their mistresses. On other evenings of the month it was the habit of Peep-O’Day-Boys who happened to find themselves disengaged to repair to the upper-room of Mr Wharton’s coffee-house, there to refresh their spirits with the society of their fellows. Stephen went inside and mounted the stairs to the upper-room.
This apartment was much like the corresponding part of any similar establishment in the city. It was as full of tobacco smoke as such resorts of the masculine half of society usually are. It was panelled in dark wood. Partitions of the same wood divided off the room into boxes so that customers were able to enjoy being in a little wooden world all their own. The bare floor was kept pleasant with fresh sawdust everyday. White cloths covered the tables and oil-lamps were kept clean and their wicks trimmed. Stephen sat down in one of the boxes and ordered a glass of port which he then proceeded to stare at gloomily.
Whenever one of the Peep-O’Day-Boys passed Stephen’s box, they would stop for a word with Stephen and he would raise a hand to them in half-hearted salutation, but tonight he did not trouble himself to answer them. This had happened, Oh!, two or three times, when suddenly Stephen heard someone say in a vivid whisper, “You are quite right to pay them no attention! For, when all is said and done, what are they but servants and drudges? And when, with my assistance, you are elevated to your rightful place at the very pinnacle of nobility and greatness, it will be a great comfort to you to remember that you spurned their friendship!” It was only a whisper, yet Stephen heard it most distinctly above the voices and laughter of the Peep-O’Days and other gentlemen. He had the odd idea that, though only a whisper, it could have passed through stone or iron or brass. It could have spoken to you from a thousand feet beneath the earth and you would have still heard i
This was so very extraordinary that for a moment he was roused from his lethargy. A lively curiosity to discover who had spoken took hold of him and he looked around the room but saw no one he did not know. So he stuck his head round the partition and looked into the next box. It contained one person of very striking appearance. He appeared very much at his ease. His arms were resting on the tops of the partition and his booted feet were resting on the table. He had several remarkable features, but the chief among them was a mass of silvery hair, as bright and soft and shining as thistle-down. He winked at Stephen. Then he rose from his own box and came and sat in Stephen’s.
“I may as well tell you,” he said, speaking in a highly confidential manner, “that this city has not the hundredth part of its former splendour! I have been gravely disappointed since my return. Once upon a time, to look upon London was to look upon a forest of towers and pinnacles and spires. The many-coloured flags and banners that flew from each and every one dazzled the eye! Upon every side one saw stone carvings as delicate as fingerbones and as intricate as flowing water! There were houses ornamented with stone dragons, griffins and lions, symbolizing the wisdom, courage and ferocity of the occupants, while in the gardens of those same houses might be found flesh-and-blood dragons, griffins and lions, locked in strong cages. Their roars, which could be clearly heard in the street, terrified the faint-of-heart. In every church a blessed saint lay, performing miracles hourly at the behest of the populace. Each saint was confined within an ivory casket, which was secreted in a jewel-studded coffin, which in turn was displayed in a magnificent shrine of gold and silver that shone night and day with the light of a thousand wax candles! Every day there was a splendid procession to celebrate one or other of these blessed saints, and London’s fame passed from world to world! Of course in those days the citizens of London were wont to come to me for advice about the construction of their churches, the arrangement of their gardens, the decoration of their houses. If they were properly respectful in their petitions I would generally give them good counsel. Oh, yes! When London owed its appearance to me it was beautiful, noble, peerless. But now …”
He made an eloquent gesture, as if he had crumpled London into a ball in his hand and thrown it away. “But how stupid you look when you stare at me so! I have put myself to any amount of trouble to pay you this visit – and you sit there silent and sullen, with your mouth hanging open! You are surprized to see me, I dare say, but that is no reason to forget all your good manners. Of course,” he remarked in the manner of someone making a great concession, “Englishmen are often all amazement in my presence – that is the most natural thing in the world – but you and I are such friends that I think I have deserved a better welcome than this!”
“Have we met before, sir?” asked Stephen in astonishment. “I have certainly dreamt of you. I dreamt that you and I were together in an immense mansion with endless, dusty corridors!”
“ ‘Have we met before, sir?’ ” mocked the gentleman with the thistle-down hair. “Why! What nonsense you talk! As if we had not attended the same feasts and balls and parties every night for weeks and weeks!”
“Certainly in my dreams …”
“I had not thought you could be so dull-witted!” cried the gentleman. “Lost-hope is not a dream! It is the oldest and most beautiful of my mansions – which are numerous – and it is quite as real as Carlton House.1 In fact it is a great deal more so! Much of the future is known to me and I tell you that Carlton House will be levelled to the ground in twenty years’ time and the city of London itself will endure, oh!, scarcely another two thousand years, whereas Lost-hope will stand until the next age of the World!” He looked ridiculously pleased with this thought, and indeed it must be said that his natural manner seemed to be one of extreme self-congratulation. “No, it is no dream. You are merely under an enchantment which brings you each night to Lost-hope to join our fairy revels!”
Stephen stared at the gentleman uncomprehendingly. Then, remembering that he must speak or lay himself open to accusations of sullenness and bad manners, he gathered his wits and stammered out, “And … And is the enchantment yours, sir?”
“But of course!”
It was clear from the pleased air with which he spoke that the gentleman with the thistle-down hair considered that he had bestowed the greatest of favours upon Stephen by enchanting him. Stephen thanked him politely for it. “… although,” he added, “I cannot imagine what I have done to deserve such kindness from you. Indeed, I am sure I have done nothing at all.”
“Ah!” cried the gentleman, delighted. “Yours are excellent manners, Stephen Black! You could teach the proud English a thing or two about the proper respect that is due to persons of quality. Your manners will bring you good luck in the end!”
“And those golden guineas in Mrs Brandy’s cash box,” said Stephen, “were they yours too?”
“Oh! Have you only just guessed it? But only observe how clever I have been! Remembering all that you told me about how you are surrounded night and day by enemies who wish you harm, I conveyed the money to a friend of yours. Then when you and she marry, the money will be yours.”
“How did …” began Stephen and stopt. Clearly there was no part of his life that the gentleman did not know about and nothing with which the gentleman did not feel entitled to interfere. “But you are mistaken about my enemies, sir,” he said, “I do not have any.”
“My dear Stephen!” cried the gentleman, greatly amused, “Of course you have enemies! And the chief among them is that wicked man who is your master and Lady Pole’s husband! He forces you to be his servant and do his bidding night and day. He sets tasks before you that are entirely unsuited to a person of your beauty and nobility. And why does he do these things?”
“I suppose because …” began Stephen.
“Precisely!” declared the gentleman triumphantly. “Because in the fulsomeness of his wickedness he has captured you and girded you with chains and now he triumphs over you, dancing about and howling with wicked laughter to see you in such straits!”
Stephen opened his mouth to protest that Sir Walter Pole had never done any of those things; that he had always treated Stephen with great kindness and affection; that when Sir Walter was younger he had paid money he could ill afford so that Stephen could go to school; and that later, when Sir Walter was poorer still, they had often eaten the same food and shared the same fire. As for triumphing over his enemies, Stephen had often seen Sir Walter wear a very self-satisfied smirk when he believed he had scored a point against his political opponents, but he had never seen him dance about or howl with wicked laughter. Stephen was about to say these things, when the mention of the word “chains” seemed to send a sort of silent thunderbolt through him. Suddenly in his fancy he saw a dark place – a terrible place – a place full of horror – a hot, rank, closed-in place. There were shadows in the darkness and the slither and clank of heavy iron chains. What this image meant or where it had come from he had not the least idea. He did not think it could be a memory. Surely he had never been in such a place?
“… If he ever were to discover that every night you and she escape from him to be happy in my house, why! he would be thrown instantly into fits of jealousy and would, I dare say, try to kill you both. But fear not, my dear, dear Stephen! I will take good care he never finds out. Oh! How I detest such selfish people! I know what it is to be scorned and slighted by the proud English and put to perform tasks that are beneath one’s dignity. I cannot bear to see the same fate befall you!” The gentleman paused to caress Stephen’s cheek and brow with his icy white fingers, which produced a queer tingling sensation in Stephen’s skin. “You cannot conceive what a warm interest I feel in you and how anxious I am to do you some lasting service! – which is why I have conceived a plan to make you the king of some fairy kingdom!”
“I … I beg your pardon, sir. I was thinking of something else. A
“Oh! That is simply the sadness you feel at the dreariness of England compared to the delightful life you lead at my house where there is always dancing and feasting and everyone is dressed in their finest clothes!”
“I dare say you are right, sir, yet if you were to find it in your heart to release me from this enchantment, I should be very grateful to you.”
“Oh! But that is impossible!” declared the gentleman. “Do you not know that my beautiful sisters and cousins – for each of whom, I may say, kings have killed each other and great empires fallen into decay – all quarrel over who will be your next dancing-partner? And what would they say if I told them you would come to Lost-hope no more? For amongst my many other virtues I am a most attentive brother and cousin and always try to please the females in my household when I can. And as for declining to become a king, there is nothing, I assure you, more agreeable than having everyone bow before one and call one by all sorts of noble titles.”
He resumed his extravagant praises of Stephen’s beauty, dignified countenance and elegant dancing – all of which he seemed to consider the chief qualifications for the ruler of a vast kingdom in Faerie – and he began to speculate upon which kingdom would suit Stephen best. “Untold-Blessings is a fine place, with dark, impenetrable forests, lonely mountains and uncrossable seas. It has the advantage of being without a ruler at present – but then it has the disadvantage that there are twenty-six other claimants already and you would be plunged straightaway into the middle of a bloody civil war – which perhaps you would not care for? Then there is the Dukedom of Pity-Me. The present Duke has no friends to speak of. Oh, but I could not bear to see any friend of mine ruler of such a miserable little place as Pity-Me!”