“He has already taught me some of that,” said Caroline, “but I never phant’sied it had anything to do with monads and so forth.”
“That system of logic may be imbued into a machine without too much difficulty,” said Daniel. “And a quarter of a century ago, Dr. Leibniz, building upon the work of Pascal, built a machine that could add, subtract, divide, and multiply. I mean simply to carry the work forward. That is all.”
“How long will it take?”
“Years and years,” said Daniel. “Longer, if I were to try to do it amid the distractions of London. So, as soon as I have delivered you to Berlin, I shall begin heading west, and not stop for long until I have reached Massachusetts. How long shall it take? Suffice it to say that by the time I have anything to show for my labors, you’ll be full-grown, and a Queen of some Realm or other. But perhaps in an idle moment you may recall the day you went to Berlin in a coach with two strange Doctors. It may even occur to you to ask yourself what became of the one who went off to America to build the Logic Mill.”
“Dr. Waterhouse, I am certain you shall come to mind more frequently than that!”
“Difficult to say-your highness shall have many distractions. But I hope I am not being too forward in saying that I should be honored to receive a letter from your highness at any time, if you should wish to inquire about the state of the Logic Mill. Or, for that matter, if I may be of service to your highness in any other way whatsoever!”
“I promise you, Dr. Waterhouse, that if any such occasion arises, I shall send you a letter.”
As best he could in a moving carriage, Daniel-who had sat up admirably straight all through the interview-bowed. “And I promise your highness that I shall respond-cheerfully and without a moment’s hesitation.”
A House Overlooking the Meuse Valley
APRIL 1696
BEFORE THE MANOR-HOUSE’S GATES, two equestrians parleyed: a stout, peg-legged Englishman in a coat that had been drab, before it had got so dirty, and a French cavalier. They were ignored by two hundred gaunt, shaggy men with shovels and picks, who were turning the house’s formal garden into a system of earthen fortifications with interlocking fields of fire.
The Englishman spoke French in theory, but perhaps not so well in practice. “Where are we?” he wanted to know, “I can’t make out if this is France, the Spanish Netherlands, or the Duchy of bloody Luxembourg.”
“Your men appear to believe it is part d’Angleterre!” said the cavalier reproachfully.
“Perhaps they are confused because an Englishman is said to reside here,” said the other. He gave the Frenchman an anxious look. “This is-is it not-the winter quarters of Count Sheerness?”
“Monsieur le comte de Sheerness has chosen to establish a household here. During intervals between campaigns, he withdraws to this place to recover his health, to read, hunt, play the harpsichord-”
“And dally with his mistress?”
“Men of France have been known to enjoy the company of women; we do not consider it a remarkable thing. Otherwise I should have appended it to the list.”
“But what I’m getting at is: There is a feminine presence here? Maids and whatnot?”
“There was, when I went out this morning to ride. Whether there is any more, I can only speculate, Monsieur Barnes, as the place has been invested, and I cannot get into it!”
“Pity, that. Say, monsieur, do tell me, is this French soil or not?”
“Like a banner in the wind, the border is ever-shifting. The soil we stand upon is not presently claimed by La France, unless le Roi has issued some new proclamation of which I have not been made aware yet.”
“Ah, that’s good-these chaps have not invaded France, then-now, that would be embarrassing.”
“Monsieur. There are some commanders in some armies who would find it embarrassing that two entire companies of their Regiment had deserted and wandered thirty miles from their assigned quarters and laid siege to the country house of a nobleman!”
“I believe it is now you and I who are laying siege to them,” observed Barnes, “as they are on the inside, and we on the out!”
The cavalier did not take the jest very well. “In wartime there are always deserters and foraging-parties. For this reason Monsieur le comte de Sheerness left orders, when he went to Londres, that musketeers were to be billeted in the stables, and the perimeters of the estate were to be patrolled night and day. In recent days these sentries have reported seeing more strange men than usual about the place, which I attributed to the spring thaw; I assumed, as anyone would, that they were French soldiers who had deserted from some regiment on the Namur front that had disintegrated from pestilence or want of food. Indeed, when I went out riding this morning, I had it in mind that when I returned to the house I ought to send word to a company of cavalry that is billeted some miles to the north, and ask that they ride down to round up a few of these deserters and hang them. Never did it enter my mind that they might be Englishmen until I was out for a gallop in a pasture down the road, and came upon a whole nest of them, and heard them talking in their jabber. I rode back to the house to find that, in my absence, upwards of a hundred men had emerged suddenly from the wooded ravines that lead down to the Meuse, and taken the estate in a coup de main! As I looked on in astonishment, the number doubled! I was going to ride north to summon help, but-”
“The roads had been blocked,” said Barnes. “And then haply I came along. Thank God! For there is still time to prevent this from developing into some sort of an incident.”
The cavalier’s eyebrows leapt up so high as to almost disappear beneath the verge of his periwig. “Monsieur! It is already an incident! Under no circumstances do the rules of war allow such a thing as this!”
“I agree fully, and you have my abject apologies as an English gentleman, monsieur. But only listen and consider what Count Sheerness himself would do, were he here. The Count is an Englishman, living in France, and commanding a regiment that, I need hardly tell you, fights nobly and loyally on the French side. Yet in the halls of Versailles, courtiers, who are not here to witness his gallantry on the field of battle, must be whispering, ‘Can we trust this Anglo-Saxon not to betray us?’ Ludicrous, I know, and unfair,” Barnes continued, holding up a hand to calm the cavalier, who looked as if he were about to lash the impertinent Barnes with his riding-crop, “but in these muddled times, an unfortunate fact of human nature. Now yonder band-”
“I should name them a battalion, not a band!”
“-of English deserters-”
“Strangely well-disciplined ones, monsieur-”
“Wandering lost, far behind enemy lines-”
“Is it wandering? Are they lost?”
“Have made camp, by a perverse accident, on the grounds of the quarters of Monsieur le comte de Sheerness. It means nothing, as you and I can plainly see; but there are those at Versailles who are bound to read something into it! Count Sheerness is detained in the Tower of London, is he not?”
“Obviously you know perfectly well that he is.”
“Some will allege, perhaps, that he is not so much detained as a willing guest, cooperating with King William, and with the King’s Own Black Torrent Guards, which happen to be headquartered in the Tower.”
The cavalier was now so incensed that all he could do, short of murdering Barnes on the spot, was to wheel his mount, gallop some yards down the road, wheel it again, and gallop back. By the time he had returned from this excursion, he had parted his lips to deliver some choice remark to Barnes; but Barnes, who had nudged his saber a few inches out of its scabbard, now drew it out altogether, and pointed it through the iron-work of the gate. This drew the cavalier’s attention, first to the saber itself, and then to half a dozen men standing attentively just inside the gate with loaded muskets cradled in their arms.