The next day I received four separate packages of five thousand pounds each. Twenty thousand pounds. I was rich. I had enough to live in luxury the rest of my life.
My troubles were just beginning.
I wasted no time, delivering for safekeeping the bulk of my money with a reputable goldsmith. I then proceeded to pay off all my debts; take a new house on Upper Brook Street, close enough to Grosvenor Square to be fashionable and close enough to Tyburn Lane to be a good value. I ordered several suits of new clothes, a few new wigs, and various items of personal and domestic furnishing, and began my life as a man of leisure.
In a matter of days, I had gone from being worth less than nothing to being rich. I was hardly the wealthiest man in the city, but a man of my sudden fortune would never need to work again. I would never want, never suffer, never lie and swindle and thieve for my next meal. I had achieved success beyond anything my father would have thought possible.
This success was, admittedly, soured by the fact that it had come of a gift from my father and that I had consigned the woman I loved to misery, but I tried not to let those two things bother me. For the first, my father had possessed the book, but not the skills or wit to use it. I had therefore bested him quite fairly. As for Lady Caroline, I told myself that she had made her choice, she had rejected me, indeed had instructed me to do precisely what I had done. Perhaps that would have sustained me had she not seen me hiding in her house, had she not, in her moment of terror and sorrow, worried about me.
A noted baronet with political ties and influence had returned from the dead. How could I have believed such a thing would not cause a stir? I suppose I hadn"t thought that part through, but soon Sir Albert"s revival was the talk of London. I was no better than one of the curious, for having returned him to life gave me no particular intimacy with the man. Indeed, it was my hope that he would never find out who it was who revived him or that I had enjoyed a particular connection with his wife.
So it happened that I had no choice but to learn what I could the same way every outsider did, from newspapers and chatter in coffeehouses. Sir Albert, it seems, was unable to tell the curious anything about what lay beyond this world. If he had gone to heaven or h.e.l.l, he could not say, for none of his experiences had left an impression upon him.That he had been somewhere and doing something, he was certain, for he had hazy memories of other people and movement and places, dynamic shadows and strong feelings, but beyond that he could say little. As for the means of his return, he was similarly vague. He knew that he had been brought back by a person who had discovered a method of returning the dead, but he did not know who this person was. If he had learned of my scheme to extract money from his wife"s friends, he said nothing of that. I suspected he had not been told, and I was quite content that he should never learn.
So while Sir Albert"s return was all Londoners wished to speak of, they knew nothing of my involvement. Indeed, the world had conspired to hide my presence well, for on every street corner there were now peddlers selling pamphlets that claimed to contain the secret method of restoring life. I purchased one of these and found it contained utter nonsense, just as I had supposed. I felt a moment of anger that dullards were profiting from my work, but I let it pa.s.s. I had profited enough.
Some readers may suspect that a man such as I might grow greedy, demand more money from the widows or seek out new victims to threaten. Anyone with whom I chose to share the secret that I was the city"s only true necromancer-and a quick demonstration with a dead creature would prove I was-and who did not want a husband or father returned would pay me what I wished. However, I was not greedy. I was not my father. I was not a man whose appet.i.tes could never be satisfied or a man incapable of keeping hold of his money. I now had all I could desire in the way of physical and material comforts, and I did not wish to tempt fate by seeking more. I was determined never to touch the book again unless some disaster should strike and I found myself in need.
I joined a new club and made new friends, and though I was not out and about quite as much as I had been before, I was nevertheless seen in public. Once or twice, after some dramatic coughing, a gentleman might bring up the unfortunate subject of rumors that circulated about me. He might say that he heard I had been exposed as charlatan and an imposter, a man with no wealth and ample pretension. To such questions, I would blush and hang my head. I would say that it was true that I had misled the world about my family, because my father was a lout and a drunkard. Not only had I been ashamed of him, but I had been in fear of him, for I knew once he had discovered that I had made my fortune in trade, he would seek me out and demand that I make my wealth his own. I had hidden my origins not only from the world, but from my parent, and he had discovered me all the same.
"As for the other matter," I would say, "I can promise you I am upon a very sure footing. I invite you to speak to any merchant with whom I do business.You will only hear that I pay my bills promptly and with good cheer. I haven"t a debt in the world, and I know of many a gentleman, some with far more wealth than I, of whom the same cannot be said."
The facts, therefore, bore out my claims, and while having had a drunken oaf for my sire might have tarnished my reputation in some circles, my evident fortune, which I displayed with tasteful reluctance, sufficed to compensate. At the theater, at the opera, and through the rambles, I rarely saw any of my old acquaintances, and when I did, nothing more than an uncomfortable bow pa.s.sed between us. Good manners and embarra.s.sment, not to mention fear of my wrath, prevented any of that set from disclosing my necromantic secret.
I had taken on my father, and I had won. I had taken on death, the king of terrors itself, and made it my servant. In doing all this, I had betrayed Lady Caroline, and that mistake still haunted me. Do not think otherwise. Not a day went by, not an hour in each day, nor even a minute in each hour, that I did not think of what I had done with regret. If only I had chosen one of the other widows to torment, how much better, how much easier, would have been my life. Perhaps Lady Caroline would not have forgiven me, but at least she would have been safe and well and happy.
I set about in an effort to erase the mistakes of my past and enjoy my new life. I took pleasure in my new friends, in being a man about town. I flirted with some women, and more, you may be certain, flirted with me. If I was not serious in any of these encounters, I managed to take some small pleasure in them. In sum, I could not change the past, and so I made it my business to enjoy the present that I had labored so hard to achieve. In this pursuit, I was successful.
But that was before the queen began to search for me.
I was dining at my club when I overheard the conversation between two older gentlemen I found intolerably fatuous. "It is most unusual," said Mr. Fallows, a man of about fifty with a long face and an enormous nose, the tip of which pointed down, almost touching his upper lip. Indeed, it wiggled when he spoke. He also had enormously wide eyes, and his wigs were inclined toward the frizzy. Taken as a whole, he gave every impression of being a man who had just been startled unto his death.
"I agree with you there, sir," said Mr. Christopher, some five years his friend"s senior. He was less grotesque in his face, but far more so in his person. Rarely did one see a man of Mr. Christopher"s rotundity. He required a cane to walk, and often the a.s.sistance of two or three servants to rise from his chair. No one liked these two save each other, but despite their disagreeable personalities and appearances, they were always remarkably well informed. It was something of a mystery how men no one was inclined to speak to somehow knew everything.
"A unique series of events," said Mr. Fallows, continuing. "No precedent, sir. None at all," agreed Mr. Christopher. They had become something of a fixture in the club. They were apt to speak thus loudly until someone inquired of their subject, for they loved nothing more than to demonstrate their knowledge. I was walking past, quite prepared to continue on, when I heard something I could not ignore.
"It"s a deuced bad time for some jackanapes to start pulling people from their graves," Mr. Fallows said. "And Sir Albert, of all people. That pot has been stirred, sir. Stirred very much indeed."
"To overflowing," agreed Mr. Christopher, nodding so that the flesh about his chin and neck jiggled like aspic. "The Germans have certainly noticed."
I paused and turned to them, raising my gla.s.s of wine in salute. "I beg your pardon, gentlemen, but I could not help but overhear."
At this, they both smiled. "All of London speaks of the necromancer, but what concern is this of the Germans?" I asked.
"Have a seat, Mr. January," Fallows said, pointing toward an empty chair. "And we shall tell you."
"With great pleasure," agreed Mr. Christopher.
I had hardly touched breeches to upholstery before Fallows began. "The queen wishes to employ the services of the necromancer. She proposes that we have a former corpse sit upon the throne."
In retrospect, I should have seen that my skill would be of interest to Queen Anne and her court. She was known to be ill, and it was widely rumored that she was dying, which was always a complicated thing for a monarch without an heir. More than ten years earlier, Parliament, determined that no Catholic monarch should ever rule the kingdom, had pa.s.sed the Act of Settlement, requiring that the succession pa.s.s over dozens of more closely related relations-all of whom were of the Romish persuasion-to descend upon the queen"s extremely distant cousin Sophia, electress of Hanover.This would be the end of the house of Stuart and the beginning of an England ruled over by German oafs. No one was pleased about this prospect. At least, no one but the Whigs, for they had worked tirelessly to ensure that England would have a Protestant monarch. Better a Protestant foreigner than an Englishman with Papist leanings.
Queen Anne, as my readers well know, had many miscarriages and brought more than a few children to term only to have them stillborn. Only once did a child of hers survive infancy, but much to the nation"s collective sadness,William, Duke of Gloucester, had died of a fever just after his own eleventh birthday.
Mr. Fallows leaned back, swirling a gla.s.s of wine in his hand. His frizzled wig sat askew on his head. "I suspect there will be much arguing about this in Parliament, but I"m not sure there is anything to be done. I"ve never heard of a bill forbidding formerly dead men from taking the throne." He sipped his drink, and wine stained the tip of his nose.
"There can be no such law pa.s.sed," said Mr. Christopher, "for such a bill would prevent Jesus from being king."
"I"m not sure He has the right to be king of England, savior or no," said Mr. Fallows. "Let Him prove his bloodlines first, I say. Ha ha. And in any case, if there were to be such a bill, Jesus as an exception could be written into it."
"Very true," his friend agreed. "We can always make an exception for the messiah."
"One moment," I said. "What precisely is the queen offering the necromancer?"
"Land," said Mr. Fallows. "Wealth and t.i.tle. He would be a duke, I should think. The man who can return her son to her will become one of the greatest men in the kingdom."
I took a drink of my own wine and considered this. I had not wanted to pursue more wealth, but a man could hardly refuse the will of his rightful monarch. I would not have my readers suppose this is mere posturing on my part, either. I was not looking for an excuse to accept this offer.The truth was, I would rather have been an obscure and comfortable gentleman than be thrust into notoriety by returning a dead prince to life. My own life should have become miserable. Perhaps I would have been a duke, but half the kingdom would have been pounding upon my door, begging me to restore this person or that. The other half would have been begging me to refrain from doing so. It would have become impossible for me to live the kind of quiet life I most enjoyed.
On the other hand, I could ask the queen not to reveal my name. I did not need to have a t.i.tle, did I? If she wished to reward me with property and gold in secret, I would accept such terms. I would be very reluctant to make it a public matter.
"I would think the necromancer, if he is a patriot, would have to obey this summons," I said.
"If he is a Tory," said Mr. Fallows.
"A Tory who has taught his technique to a friend," added Mr. Christopher, "for he will be a dead Tory the moment he steps forward."
"What do you mean?" I asked, trying to conceal my alarm.
"It is inevitable," said Mr. Christopher, "that this offer has been met with very little delight from the Whigs. They have invested in the Hanoverians, and they mean to have their German monarch. The Whigs will not allow their chance at power to escape them. Far easier to slit the necromancer"s throat, I should think."
"Surely they would not murder to advance politics," I said.
Both men laughed. I do not recommend gazing upon such men laughing. It is unpretty.
"No, sir," said Mr. Christopher with a slap upon his ma.s.sive thigh. "Not politics. Money. There are contracts, positions, sinecures to be had once the Hanoverians take the crown.They have been waiting for Anne to die, and now that she is upon the threshold of the abyss, they will not allow some petty magician to ruin their chances."
"It is so very ironic," said Mr. Fallows, "that the most dangerous enemy this necromancer will have is the one man he is known to have returned from the grave."
"Sir Albert Worthington?" I asked.