Equinox

Chapter 14

Cambridge: the evening of 10 August 1690

John Wickins had come up to Cambridge in 1663 and now it was as familiar to him as his mother's face. He knew every turn of every lane, every plant and every weed that sprang forth from the paving stones on his regular walks. He knew every college Fellow and each townsman who crossed his path. He had enjoyed many of the same routines for almost three decades: he bought his books at the same shop, filled his inkwell from the same stationer's, had his clothes tailored in precisely the same way by the same, now elderly tailor, and he purchased his snuff from the same dealer who had first procured it for him twenty or more years earlier. But now he was leaving, and the place no longer seemed the same.

Wickins had been in great haste, and had hired a horse to make the journey back from Oxford that day. Arriving at dusk, he had handed the reins to

the stable boy and the horse had been fed and watered in the college stables. It was an unusual luxury to allow himself, but he had big plans and he could not waste time on overcrowded snail-like coaches. There was no denying that he was excited by the prospect of the new position offered him, the rectorship of St Mary's, Oxford. It was an opportunity he could not let pass. Now was the time to make the break from Cambridge and all that his life there entailed.

Of course, that meant leaving Isaac Newton. Wickins and Newton had had a very odd relationship. They had met during their first term, each of them miserable and less than enamoured with the majority of the other students. Each had arrived expecting to fall into a challenging whirlpool of learning, but instead they had found that very few students cared for anything but drinking, gambling and whoring. He and Newton had similar backgrounds: each had been raised within the lower gentry. Wickins's father had been a schoolmaster, Newton's father had died before Newton was born and his mother had married a local vicar. Neither of them had the slightest thing in common with most of the young men who had gone up in their year. Many of these had been the sons of wealthy landowners and successful merchants; but even those clots had been better than the laziest and stupidest of all students — the vile offspring of the nobility whose families paid for the academic success of their sons.

Wickins crossed the quad of Trinity College and entered under the archway leading to his staircase. He was walking slowly, almost as though he was trying to put off the inevitable. He had experienced some good times here in this great city. He could admit that most of his life had been a mundane routine comprised of study, then his theological researches. But these had been interspersed with times helping Newton with his scientific work, copying texts for him, assisting whenever he could. During those periods, he could tell himself with confidence that he had come closer to the great Isaac Newton than any other man had ever come. Then there had been times when physical need had brought them a unique intimacy, actions about which they never spoke and kept locked away from the world. And, of course, there was always the real purpose to his living in such close proximity to the man, the reason he had first been encouraged to meet Newton and befriend him. Newton, he had grown to understand, was the most dangerous man alive.

Wickins reached the door to their rooms, fished his key from the pocket of his tunic and turned it in the lock. The hallway and the rooms leading off to left and right were cast in gloom. Warm air blew through an opened window at the end of the hall. The door to his bedchamber was closed, but the one to the right, leading into Newton's room and beyond that to his laboratory, stood ajar. It was unusually quiet. The only sound came from a pair of thrushes nesting in an elm tree just beyond the opened window.

Now that he was there, Wickins suddenly experienced a great swell of uncertainty about his plans. This was his home. He felt secure here. Was he doing the right thing by throwing it all away and chasing after a new life in Oxford?

He felt sure that his mission in Cambridge was now over. The work had been of great importance and he could not have left any sooner. So, about this at least, he felt no guilt. The conjunction of the planets was due the following night, 11 August, and it was clear that no one was about to try the experiment. If Newton was not preparing for it, then nobody else would have the ability, the knowledge or the ambition to do so. Wickins's friends in Oxford had been watching for tell-tale signs, but there appeared to have been nothing suspicious going on there. They had learned of one murder the previous week, but it was clear to them that the girl had died at the hands of her lover who had then killed himself. Or, at least, that was all they had managed to ascertain. But even his friends had to admit that many crimes could be easily covered up and that they could never know for sure. Most crucially, though, Wickins thought as he removed his shoulder bag, jacket and hat and placed them on the hooks in the hall, the ruby sphere was almost certainly safe in its repository. And no alchemical genius had emerged with the ancient codes and Hermetic knowledge to acquire the precious thing.

Wickins was surprised to see that the door leading into Newton's laboratory was open. The bedlinen lay in a crumbled heap. Plates of food had been left ignored on the floor. The window was open and on the wide windowsill stood a bowl of water. It was clean, untouched. Wickins edged his way over to the laboratory. His heart was pounding. A sudden irrational fear had shot through him. Newton was always so careful to maintain his privacy.

His friend had not heard him. Newton was standing with his back to the laboratory door, the glow from the fire lighting up one side of his face. He was cradling something in his palms. It was a thing that Wickins had never before seen in the waking world, a thing of mythology, but something he also knew to be real, sacred beyond words, the nexus of all meaning: the ruby sphere.

Wickins thought he was going to scream, but thankfully no sound came. Yet still the horror would not dissipate. With an almost supernatural effort he managed to raise his hand to his face and grip the skin of his cheeks with his fingernails. It was an almost involuntary act, as though he was trying to convince himself that he was still alive, that what he was witnessing was wholly real.

One of the thrushes landed on the windowsill and tapped at the water bowl. Newton spun round.

During the two seconds that followed, a million clashing thoughts ran through Wickins's mind, but he was really only aware of two. One told him to flee, to race to Oxford and to warn his friends. The other impulse screamed at him to rush into the room to grab the sphere.

In the time it took him to cover the distance to where Newton sat, the scientist had raised himself out of his chair and braced himself for the onslaught.

For a man of almost fifty who had spent his entire life in study, Newton was surprisingly agile. Wickins made a grab for him, but Newton shifted to one side; he lost his balance but managed to break his fall by gripping the table by the fireplace. He spun round and saw Newton grasping at a sheaf of papers that lay on a table close by.

'Isaac, you cannot do this thing,' Wickins screamed. 'Please. . you know not. .'

But Newton seemed oblivious to him. A sudden fury seized Wickins when he realised in an instant that he was wasting his breath. He sprang forward and grabbed Newton by the shoulder. The scientist twisted. Wickins lost his grip and whirled around. He could see the sphere cupped in his room-mate's right hand, and then Newton's fist encasing the sphere came rushing towards his face. He just managed to sidestep the blow, and as he swerved to one side he brought his hand across Newton's face, scratching his cheek. Newton yelped and with blind fury lashed out at Wickins, catching him squarely on the jaw. "Tis mine,' he yelled, his eyes ablaze.

Wickins fell backwards and landed heavily against the shelves, his head smashing against the wood and causing several jars and bottles to wobble and fall. They crashed to the floor except for a bottle of yellowish liquid labelled 'Oil of Vitriol' which landed squarely on Wickins's shoulder, popped its cork and spilled its contents across his arm. He screamed but, almost before the sound had left his mouth, Newton, a look of manic fury etched into his features, took one step forward and kicked him squarely in the face. Wickins slammed back against the floor, unconscious.

When Wickins awoke, it was completely dark. The fire had dwindled to nothing, it was chilly and the smells that reached him were almost overwhelming.

Most disturbing was the unmistakable odour of corroded flesh.

Wickins pulled himself to his feet. The pain in his head almost made him fall to his knees, and his arm throbbed. Stumbling into the next room he saw that there was a little more light. The moon had risen and a silver haze hung over everything. He looked at his arm. The fabric of his shirt had burned away and his flesh was red and blistered. He strode over to the bowl of water on the sill and, soaking a shirt that lay nearby, he dabbed the wet cloth on his arm.

So Newton had the ruby sphere. This was Wickins's worst nightmare come true. He tried to think through the pain. The cool water on his arm helped, but the burn was agonising and his head felt like a dozen workmen with mallets were slamming into his skull as though attacking a resistant mound of rock.

Wickins remembered the timepiece that Newton kept in his room and went to check it. The fourth hour after midnight had passed. He must have been unconscious for a long time. He cursed under his breath. Cupping his hands in the water bowl again he swilled some water around his mouth before spitting it out, red, into the bowl.

Once again he tried to think, but the pain continued to stifle his thoughts. Newton had gone. He could be close to Oxford now, or perhaps he had gone elsewhere to prepare. The conjunction was less than twenty-four hours away. What was Wickins to do? He could send a message to Oxford, but he could not trust a courier with such a grave matter. And besides, what would he say?

A few moments later he was heading out the door, making for the stables, his jacket and hat on, bag over his shoulder.

The stable boy was not best pleased to see Wickins but a shilling brightened him up and he led the way to the stalls. Newton had been there earlier in the evening, the boy told him, but he had said nothing and had seemed even more distracted and unfriendly than usual.

Wickins chose a chestnut mare, one of the best horses in the stable, and gave the payment to the lad in a sealed envelope to be passed on to the bursar. He would, he told him, explain everything to the stable master upon his return a few days hence. He had urgent business to attend to and he simply could not waste a moment. Then, feeling half-dead, Wickins snapped the reins, pulled the mare round and headed for the gates and the main road beyond.

He made Ickwell village, sixty miles west of Cambridge, in two hours, and as the sun rose full above the hedgerows, a fresh horse, a grey gelding, took him through Brill, Horton-cum-Studley and then Islip before he joined the road that would take him to the Eastgate of Oxford. He reached the city walls an hour and a half later. At a trot, he turned along Merton Street before dismounting and allowing a boy to lead the horse away. Then he headed straight for University College.

'Great shit!' Robert Hooke exclaimed as John Wickins finished recounting his story. 'A pox on the man.' And he took a huge snort of snuff up his nostril.

They were sitting in a commodious apartment in University College overlooking The High, a set of rooms that Robert Boyle occupied each August as part of his honorarium. Wickins felt utterly drained and his arm and head throbbed. He had been received by Boyle who, in spite of the fact that he looked frail and tired himself, had insisted that he inspect and treat the other man's wounds immediately. With practised delicacy, he had probed at the blistered skin on Wickins's forearm before bandaging it tightly. To his sore head Boyle had applied a paste of cat urine and mouse droppings that he found particularly efficacious for headaches. As the old man tended him, Wickins described the recent events in Cambridge. Boyle was calm and he absorbed the information with a sigh here, a mild grunt there. Occasionally pausing for a moment in the task of tending the wounds, he would search Wickins's face, his piercing green eyes searching for something indefinable. Then Hooke had arrived, responding to the urgent message taken to him by a footman. The very opposite of Boyle, he had blustered and fumed, sworn and cursed before throwing himself into a chair by the empty fireplace.

'That abominable creature, that.. that… clyster-pipe,' he growled, reaching for his pouch of snuff.

Wickins, in spite of his agonies, was shocked. 'Sir, please, refrain. .'

'Why should I refrain?' Hooke snapped back. 'There is no better way to describe your esteemed Lucasian Professor. Indeed, 'tis perhaps too mild a description. And I might add that you, sir, are little better than he.'

At that moment Wickins could see precisely why Newton so loathed the man. Hooke's twisted, stunted frame was almost as ugly as his personality.

'Come now, gentlemen,' Boyle interjected. 'I think John would be entirely happy to concede before us here that he has made errors over the matter of his room-mate. But what is now essential is to forge solutions, not recriminations.'

'But it was I who warned you both,' Hooke insisted. Turning from Wickins to Boyle, he added. 'There is no limit to the man's ambition. I told you, sir, in London, after Wren's talk, that Newton had discerned something of value.'

'I do not even recall his presence there,' Boyle replied.

'He stood to the rear of the hall, close to the door. I glimpsed him from the stage. I was not mistaken. He was gone almost as Wren reached his conclusion.'

'And you claimed that you confronted Wren on the matter.'

'I did,' Hooke said almost as a whisper. 'But he would tell me nothing. The man has never liked me.'

Wickins failed to stifle a snort. 'Master,' Wickins said looking across to Boyle. 'I am devastated by my stupidity over this. But if I may be allowed a single expression of self-mitigation, it would be simply to say that even if we had held genuine suspicions about Newton's awareness of the ruby sphere, I would have found it almost impossible to believe that he had the knowledge to snatch the precious thing from under our very noses. Nor could I have brought myself to believe that he might know what to do with it if he had.'

'It was you, dullard, who was assigned the task of watching over the demon!' Hooke exclaimed.

'Gentlemen,' Boyle said, 'I have neither the energy nor the will to repeat myself this sorry morning. You must drop this malice, or else all may be lost. If you do not start to assume the mantle of intelligence and dignity, our friend Isaac Newton will have the better of us. And, make no mistake, he is a most formidable opponent.'

They fell silent for a moment. Wickins was suddenly aware of the sounds of the city coming through an opened window. It was almost nine o'clock and, although Oxford was virtually empty of students, the city remained alive with the noises of traders and street hawkers, of carts ambling along The High. Far off, the clatter of hammers and the crisp rush of saw against wood could be heard as builders worked on repairs to a college roof.

'What are your thoughts, Master?' Hooke refrained from looking in Wickins's direction. 'You know my feelings about Newton. He is piss-proud. Others know this to be true — some from bitter experience. But only a fool would deny his brilliance.'

'Your words are typically plain, Robert, but of course they are true. It pains me to say such a thing, but I fear we must assume the worst. Newton will be working with others. That is a necessity even he cannot avoid, however much he would naturally hate the fact. We must also assume that these men have been in this city a while and that, in spite of our failure to learn of such things, they have bloodied their hands. We all know what the ritual entails.' Boyle looked at each of the other men gravely.

'Gentlemen, through inaction we now face terrible danger. We must, each of us' — he fixed Hooke with a stare that would have made stronger men wither — 'do all that is within our power to thwart the Lucasian Professor tonight. Time is against us, my friends. We must begin our preparations immediately.'