Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell (109 page)

In the fish-market by the Grand Canal a fisherman sold Frank three mullet, but then almost neglected to take the money because his attention was given to the argument he was conducting with his neighbour as to whether the English magician had gone mad because he was a magician, or because he was English. On the way home two pale-faced nuns scrubbing the marble steps of a church wished Frank a good morning and told him that they intended to say prayers for the poor, mad English magician. Then just as he was almost at the house-door, a white cat stepped out from under a gondola seat, sprang on to the quayside and gave him a look. He waited for it to say something about Jonathan Strange, but it did not.

"How in God's name did this happen?" asked Dr Greysteel, sitting up in bed. "Do you think Mr Strange went out and spoke to someone?"

Frank did not know. Out he went again and made some inquiries. It seemed that Strange had not yet stirred from the room at the top of the house in Santa Maria Zobenigo; but Lord Byron (who was the one person in all the city who treated the appearance of Eternal Night as a sort of entertainment) had visited him at about five o'clock the previous evening and had found him still doing magic and raving about candles, pineapples, dances that went on for centuries and dark woods that filled the streets of Venice. Byron had gone home and told his mistress, his landlord and his valet; and, as these were all sociable people much given to spending their evenings among large groups of talkative friends, the number of people who knew by morning was quite remarkable.

"Lord Byron! Of course!" cried Dr Greysteel. "I forgot all about him! I must go and warn him to be discreet."

"I think it's a little late for that, sir," said Frank.

Dr Greysteel was obliged to admit the truth of this. Nevertheless he felt he should like to consult someone. And who better than Strange's other friend? So that evening he dressed carefully and went in his gondola to the house of the Countess Albrizzi. The Countess was a clever Greek lady of mature years, who had published some books upon sculpture; but her chief delight was to give
conversazioni
where all sorts of fashionable and learned people could meet each other. Strange had attended one or two, but until tonight Dr Greysteel had never troubled about them.

He was shewn to a large room on the
piano nobile
. It was richly decorated with marble floors, wonderful statues, and painted walls and ceilings. At one end of the room the ladies sat in a semi-circle around the Countess. The men stood at the other end. From the moment he entered the room Dr Greysteel felt the eyes of the other guests upon him. More than one person was pointing him out to his neighbour. There was little doubt but that they were talking of Strange and the Darkness.

A small, handsome man was standing by the window. He had dark, curly hair and a full, soft, red mouth. It was a mouth which would have been striking upon a woman, but on a man it was simply extraordinary. With his small stature, carefully chosen clothes and dark hair and eyes, he had a little of the look of Christopher Drawlight – but only if Drawlight had been fearfully clever. Dr Greysteel went up to him directly, and said, "Lord Byron?"

The man turned to see who spoke. He did not look best pleased to be addressed by a dull, stout, middle-aged Englishman. Yet he could not deny who he was. "Yes?"

"My name is Greysteel. I am a friend of Mr Strange."

"Ah!" said his lordship. "The physician with the beautiful daughter!"

Dr Greysteel, in his turn, was not best pleased to hear his daughter spoken of in such terms by one of the most notorious rakes in Europe, yet he could not deny that Flora was beautiful. Putting it aside for the moment, he said, "I have been to see Strange. All my worst fears are confirmed. His reason is quite overturned."

"Oh, quite!" agreed Byron. "I was with him again a few hours ago and could not get him to talk of any thing but his dead wife and how she is not really dead, but merely enchanted. And now he shrouds himself in Darkness and works Black Magic! There is something rather admirable in all this, do you not agree?"

"Admirable?" said the doctor sharply. "Say pitiable rather! But do you think he made the Darkness? He told me quite plainly that he had not."

"But of course he made it!" declared Byron. "A Black World to match his Black Spirits! Who would not blot out the sun some- times? The difference is that when one is a magician, one can actually do it."

Dr Greysteel considered this. "You may be right," he conceded. "Perhaps he created the Darkness and then forgot about it. I do not think he always remembers what he has said or done. I have found that he retains very little impression of my earlier conversa- tions with him."

"Ah. Well. Quite," said his lordship, as if there was nothing very surprizing in this and that he too would be glad to forget the doctor's conversation just as soon as he could. "Were you aware that he has written to his brother-in-law?"

"No, I did not know that."

"He has instructed the fellow to come to Venice to see his dead sister."

"Do you think he will come?" asked Dr Greysteel.

"I have not the least idea!" Lord Byron's tone implied that it was somewhat presumptuous of Dr Greysteel to expect the Great- est Poet of the Age to interest himself in such matters. There was a moment or two of silence and then he added in a more natural tone, "To own the truth, I believe he will not come. Strange shewed me the letter. It was full of disjointed ramblings and reasonings that none but a madman – or a magician! – could understand."

"It is a very bitter thing," said Dr Greysteel. "Very bitter indeed! Only the day before yesterday we were walking with him. He was in such cheerful spirits! To have gone from complete sanity to complete madness in the space of one night, I cannot under- stand it. I wonder if there might not be some physical cause. Some infection perhaps?"

"Nonsense!" declared Byron. "The causes of his madness are purely metaphysical. They lie in the vast chasm between that which one is, and that which one desires to become, between the soul and the flesh. Forgive me, Dr Greysteel, but this is a matter of which I have experience. Of this I can speak with authority."

"But . . ." Dr Greysteel frowned and paused to collect his thoughts. "But the period of intense frustration appeared to be over. His work was going well."

"All I can tell you is this. Before this peculiar obsession with his dead wife, he was full of quite another matter: John Uskglass. You must have observed that? Now I know very little of English magicians. They have always seemed to me a parcel of dull, dusty old men – except for John Uskglass. He is quite another matter! The magician who tamed the Otherlanders!
²
The only magician to defeat Death! The magician whom Lucifer himself was forced to treat as an equal! Now, whenever Strange compares himself to this sublime being – as he must from time to time – he sees himself for what he truly is: a plodding, earth-bound mediocrity! All his achievements – so praised up in the desolate little isle
³
– crumble to dust before him! That will bring on as fine a bout of despair as you ould wish to see.
This is to be mortal, And seek the things beyond
mortality.
" Lord Byron paused for a moment, as if committing the last remark to memory in case he should want to put it in a poem. "I myself was touched with something of the same melancholia when I was in the Swiss mountains in September. I wandered about, hearing avalanches every five minutes – as if God was bent upon my destruction! I was full of regrets and immortal longings. Several times I was sorely tempted to blow my brains out – and I would have done it too, but for the recollection of the pleasure it would give my mother-in-law."

Lord Byron might shoot himself any day of the week for all that Dr Greysteel cared. But Strange was another matter. "You think him capable of self-destruction?" he asked, anxiously.

"Oh, certainly!"

"But what is to be done?"

"Done?" echoed his lordship, slightly perplexed. "Why would you want to do any thing?" Then, feeling that they had talked long enough about someone else, his lordship turned the conversa- tion to himself. "Upon the whole I am glad that you and I have met, Dr Greysteel. I brought a physician with me from England, but I was obliged to dismiss him at Genova. Now I fear my teeth are coming loose. Look!"
⁴
Byron opened his mouth wide and displayed his teeth to Dr Greysteel.

Dr Greysteel gently tugged on a large, white tooth. "They seem very sound and firm to me," he said.

"Oh! Do you think so? But not for long, I fear. I grow old. I wither. I can feel it." Byron sighed. Then, struck by a more cheerful thought, he added, "You know, this crisis with Strange could not have come at a better time. I am by chance writing a poem about a magician who wrestles with the Ineffable Spirits who rule his destiny. Of course, as a model for my magician Strange is far from perfect – he lacks the true heroic nature; for that I shall be obliged to put in something of myself."

A lovely young Italian girl passed by. Byron tilted his head to a very odd angle, half-closed his eyes and composed his features to suggest that he was about to expire from chronic indigestion. Dr Greysteel could only suppose that he was treating the young woman to the Byronic profile and the Byronic expression.

1 German for magician.

2 A somewhat poetical name for fairies.

3 Lord Byron is speaking of Great Britain.

4 See Byron's letter to Augusta Leigh, October 28th, 1816.

57
The Black Letters
1

December 1816

Santa Maria Zobenigo, Venice
Jonathan Strange to the Reverend Henry Woodhope
Dec. 3rd, 1816.

My dear Henry,

You must prepare yourself for wonderful news.
I have seen Arabella.
I have seen her and spoken to her. Is that not glorious? Is that not the best of all possible news? You will not believe me. You will not understand it. Be assured it was not a dream. It was not drunkenness, or madness, or opium. Consider: you have only to accept that last Christmas at Clun we were half- enchanted, and all becomes believable, all becomes possible. It is ironic, is it not, that I of all people did not recognize magic when it wrapped itself about me? In my own defence I may say that it was of a quite unexpected nature and came from a quarter I could never have foreseen. Yet to my shame other people were quicker-witted than me. John Hyde knew that something was wrong and tried to warn me, but I did not listen to him. Even you, Henry, told me quite plainly that I was too taken up with my books, that I neglected my responsibilities and my wife. I resented your advice and on several occasions gave you a rude answer. I am sorry for it now and humbly beg your pardon. Blame me as much as you want. You cannot think me half so much at fault as I think myself. But to come to the point of all this. I need you to come here to Venice. Arabella is in a place not very far distant from here, but she cannot leave it and I cannot go there - at least [several lines expunged]. My friends here in Venice are well-meaning souls, but they plague me with questions. I have no servant and there is something here which makes it hard for me to go about the city unob- served. Of this I shall say no more. My dear, good Henry, please do not make difficulties. Come straightaway to Venice. Your reward will be Arabella safe and well and restored to us. For what other reason has God made me the Greatest Magician of the Age if not for this?
Your brother,
S

Santa Maria Zobenigo, Venice
Jonathan Strange to the Reverend Henry Woodhope
Dec. 6th, 1816.

My dear Henry,

I have been somewhat troubled in my conscience since I wrote to you last. You know that I have never lied to you, but I confess that I have not told you enough for you to form an accurate opinion of how matters stand with Arabella at present. She is not dead but . . . [12 lines crossed out and indecipherable] . . . under the earth, within the hill which they call the
brugh
. Alive, yet not alive - not dead either -
enchanted
. It has been their habit since time immemorial to steal away Christian men and women and make servants of them, or force them - as in this case - to take part in their dreary pastimes: their dances, their feasts, their long, empty celebrations of dust and nothingness. Among all the reproaches which I heap on my own head the bitterest by far is that I have betrayed her - she whom my first duty was to protect.

Santa Maria Zobenigo, Venice
Jonathan Strange to the Reverend Henry Woodhope
Dec. 15th, 1816.

My dear Henry,

It grieves me to tell you that I now have better grounds for the uneasiness I told you of in my last letter.
²
I have done every- thing I can think of to break the bars of her black prison, but without success. There is no spell that I know of that can make the smallest dent in such ancient magic. For aught I know there is no such spell in the whole English canon. Stories of magicians freeing captives from Faerie are few and far between. I cannot now recall a single one. Somewhere in one of his books Martin Pale describes how fairies can grow tired of their human guests and expel them without warning from the
rugh
; the poor captives find themselves back home, but hundreds of years after they left it. Perhaps that is what will happen. Arabella will return to England long after you and I are dead. That thought freezes my blood. I cannot disguise from you that there is a black mood upon me. Time and I have quarrelled. All hours are midnight now. I had a clock and a watch, but I destroyed them both. I could not bear the way they mocked me. I do not sleep. I
cannot
eat. I take wine - and something else. Now at times I become a little wild. I shake and laugh and weep for a time - I cannot say
what
time; perhaps an hour, perhaps a day. But enough of that. Madness is the key. I believe I am the first English magician to understand that. Norrell was right - he said we do not need fairies to help us. He said that madmen and fairies have much in common, but I did not understand the implications then, and neither did he. Henry, you cannot conceive of how desperately I need you here. Why do you not come? Are you ill? I have received no replies to my letters, but this may mean that you are already on the road to Venice and this letter may perhaps never reach you.