He waved a hand, gesturing at an invisible map. ‘It’s junctures like that where we have control. If we push in the right spots – if we create losses where the Empire can’t stand to suffer them – then we’ve moved things to the breaking point. Then the future becomes fluid, and change is possible. History isn’t a premade tapestry that we’ve got to suffer, a closed world with no exit. We can form it. Make it. We just have to choose to make it.’
‘You really believe that,’ said Robin, amazed. Griffin’s faith astounded him. For Robin, such abstract reasoning was a reason to divest from the world, to retreat into the safety of dead languages and books. For Griffin, it was a rallying call.
‘I have to,’ said Griffin. ‘Otherwise, you’re right. Otherwise we’ve got nothing.’
After that conversation, Griffin seemed to have decided Robin wasn’t about to betray the Hermes Society, for Robin’s assignments vastly increased in number. Not all of his missions involved theft. More often Griffin made requests for materials – etymological handbooks, Grammatica pages, orthography charts – which were easily acquired, copied out, and returned without drawing attention. Still, he had to be clever with when and how he took the books out, as he’d attract suspicion if he kept sneaking away materials unrelated to his focus areas. One time Ilse, the upperclassman from Japan, demanded to know what he was doing with the Old German Grammatica, and he had to stammer out a story about pulling the title by accident in the course of trying to trace a Chinese word back to Hittite origins. No matter that he was at the entirely wrong section of the library. Ilse seemed ready to believe he was simply that dim.
By and large, Griffin’s requests were painless. It was all less romantic than Robin had imagined – and, perhaps, hoped for. There were no thrilling escapades or coded conversations spoken on bridges over running water. It was all so mundane. The great achievement of the Hermes Society, Robin learned, was how effectively it rendered itself invisible, how completely it concealed information even from its members. If one day Griffin disappeared, then Robin would be hard-pressed to prove to anyone the Hermes Society ever existed except as a figment of his imagination. He often felt that he wasn’t a part of a secret society at all, but rather of a large, boring bureaucracy that functioned with exquisite coordination.
Even the thefts became routine. Babel’s professors seemed wholly unaware that anything was being stolen at all. The Hermes Society took silver only in amounts small enough to mask with some accounting trickery, for the virtue of a humanities faculty, Griffin explained, was that everyone was hopeless with numbers.
‘Playfair would let entire crates of silver disappear if no one checked him,’ he told Robin. ‘Do you think he keeps tidy books? The man can barely add figures in two digits.’
Some days Griffin did not mention Hermes at all, but instead spent the hour it took to reach Port Meadow and back inquiring about Robin’s life at Oxford – his rowing exploits, his favourite bookshops, his thoughts on the food in hall and in the Buttery.
Robin answered cautiously. He kept waiting for the ball to drop, for Griffin to spin this conversation into an argument, for his own preference for plain scones to become the proof of his infatuation with the bourgeoisie. But Griffin only kept asking, and gradually it dawned on Robin that perhaps Griffin just missed being a student.
‘I do love the campus at Christmastime,’ said Griffin one night. ‘It’s the season when Oxford leans most into the magic of itself.’
The sun had set. The air had gone from pleasantly chilly to bone-cuttingly cold, but the city was bright with Christmas candles, and a light trickle of snow floated down around them. It was lovely. Robin slowed his pace, wanting to savour the scene, but Griffin, he noticed, was shivering madly.
‘Griffin, don’t . . . ’ Robin hesitated; he didn’t know how to ask politely. ‘Is that the only coat you have?’
Griffin recoiled like a dog rising on its hackles. ‘Why?’
‘It’s just – I’ve got a stipend, if you wanted to buy something warmer—’
‘Don’t patronize me.’ Robin regretted instantly that he’d ever brought it up. Griffin was too proud. He could take no charity; he could not even take sympathy. ‘I don’t need your money.’
‘Suit yourself,’ said Robin, wounded.
They walked for another block in silence. Then Griffin asked, in an obvious attempt at an olive branch, ‘What’s on for Christmas?’
‘First there’ll be dinner in hall.’
‘So endless Latin prayers, rubber goose, and a Christmas pudding that’s indistinguishable from pig slop. What’s really on?’
Robin grinned. ‘Mrs Piper has some pies waiting for me in Jericho.’
‘Steak and kidney?’
‘Chicken and leek. My favourite. And a lemon tart for Letty, and a chocolate pecan dessert pie for Ramy and Victoire—’
‘Bless your Mrs Piper,’ Griffin said. ‘The professor had some frigid crone named Mrs Peterhouse in my time. Couldn’t cook to save her life, no, but always remembered to say something about half-breeds whenever I was in earshot. He didn’t like that either, though; I suppose that’s why he let her go.’
They turned left onto Cornmarket. They were very near the tower now, and Griffin seemed fidgety; Robin suspected they would soon part ways.
‘Before I forget.’ Griffin reached into his coat, pulled out a wrapped parcel, and tossed it at Robin. ‘I got you something.’
Surprised, Robin pulled at the string. ‘A tool?’
‘Just a present. Merry Christmas.’
Robin tore away the paper, which revealed a lovely, freshly printed volume.
‘You said you liked Dickens,’ said Griffin. ‘They’d just bound the serialization of his latest – you might have already read it, but I thought you’d like it all in one piece.’
He’d bought Robin the three-volume set of Oliver Twist. For a moment Robin could only stammer – he hadn’t known they were exchanging gifts, he hadn’t bought anything for Griffin – but Griffin waved this off. ‘That’s all right, I’m older than you, don’t embarrass me.’
Only later, after Griffin had disappeared down Broad Street, coat flapping around his ankles, would Robin realize this selection had been Griffin’s idea of a joke.
Come back with me, he almost said when they parted. Come to hall. Come back and have Christmas dinner.
But that was impossible. Robin’s life was split into two, and Griffin existed in the shadow world, hidden from sight. Robin could never bring him back to Magpie Lane. Could never introduce him to his friends. Could never, in daylight, call him brother.
‘Well.’ Griffin cleared his throat. ‘Next time, then.’
‘When will that be?’
‘Don’t know yet.’ He was already walking away, snow filling in his footsteps. ‘Watch your window.’
On the first day of Hilary term, the main entrance to Babel was blocked off by four armed policemen. They appeared to be engaged with someone or something inside, though whatever it was, Robin could not see over the crowd of shivering scholars.
‘What’s happened?’ Ramy asked the girls.
‘They’re saying it was a break-in,’ said Victoire. ‘Someone wanted to pilfer some silver, I suppose.’
‘So what, the police were here at precisely the right time?’ asked Robin.
‘He set off some alarm when he tried to get through the door,’ said Letty. ‘And the police, I think, came quickly.’
A fifth and sixth policeman emerged from the building, dragging the man Robin assumed was the thief between them. He was middle-aged, dark-haired, bearded, and dressed in very grimy clothes. Not Hermes, then, Robin thought with some relief. The thief’s face was contorted in pain, and his moans floated over the crowd as the police pulled him down the steps towards a waiting cab. They left a streak of blood on the cobblestones behind them.