After church we returned to Newton’s house and, leaving Miss Barton and Mrs. Rogers in the kitchen for a while, I sought my master out in his laboratory which was in a basement cellar with a window that gave onto a small back garden. This laboratory was well furnished with chymical materials such as bodies, receivers, heads, several crucibles and a furnace that was by now as hot as the lowest part of hell and which made my master sweat mightily.
At the sound of my footsteps he glanced around and waved me toward him with a cry of satisfaction. “Ah, Mister Ellis,” he shouted over the roar of his furnace. “You are just in time to see my own freakish trial of the pyx,” he said, placing Mister Fell’s guinea in a heated crucible. The trial of the pyx was the ancient ordeal by which the purity of gold and silver in the new-minted coin was tested by a jury of the Company of Goldsmiths.
“To my way of thinking, a man’s trying to turn lead into gold is as absurd as expecting bread and wine to become the body and blood of Jesus Christ. It is what they represent that should inspire us. Nature is not merely chemical and physical, but also intellectual. And we should accept the spirit of enquiry that is implicit in this
“Now let us see what has become of this guinea.”
Newton fell to inspecting the contents of his crucible while I thought about what he had said. What his meaning might be, I was not completely able to penetrate into at the time, but later on I saw that he aimed at something beyond the reach of human art and industry.
“Look there,” he said and, holding the crucible with a pair of tongs, showed me the melted metal.
“Is it counterfeit?” I asked. “I cannot tell. Even now it looks to me like real spanks.”
“You see, but you do not observe. Look more closely. There is not one but four, possibly even five, metals present here: I know not yet what they may be, but I’ve a strong fancy this coin is mostly copper. Which brings us much trouble, for I have never seen such an ingenious facsimile, not these past nine months. If there be many more like it besides … ” Newton left off speaking and shook his head gravely, as if the prospect was too terrible to countenance.
“But how was it done, master? Do you think this is the same process that Humphrey Hall spoke of?”
“I do indeed,” said Newton. “The process was devised in France, during the last century. I am not privy to understanding all the secrets thereof, but the key is thought to be, as in many, mercury. In truth, no one knows more about mercury than me. About three years ago, I almost poisoned myself through breathing the vapours of mercury—although this effect is not well known. Mercury demands respect. It is not something that may be used with much safety, and this will assist our investigations, for there are many outward signs of mercury’s abuse.”
“What are we to do?”
“What would you have me do?”
“I should question John Berningham about this false guinea. We may perhaps persuade him to make a clean breast of it.”
“That will take a while,” said Newton. “So very often one such as he will lie and keep on lying until he feels Jack Ketch breathing down his neck. It would be better to know much more of this matter before we questioned him. You say that he paid to have his wife visit him?”
“Yes sir. An ounce of silver for the privilege, in advance.”
“Then she may be the key that will open the door.” Newton looked up. “But I hear that the Dean has arrived, and I must play the host.”
Putting on our coats, we went back upstairs for dinner. The Dean was a more congenial dining companion than he was a preacher, and kept Newton occupied with divers matters of theology while Miss Barton and I made eyes at each other. And once or twice she did even rub my shin with her stockinged foot, while all the time discussing the Dean’s sermon, which made me think she was more wicked than I had ever suspected.
After dinner Newton stood up from the table and announced that he and I had Mint business to attend to, and, reluctantly, I took my leave of Miss Barton.
“Are we going to the Mint?” I asked, when we were outside the house in Jermyn Street.
“Did not Mister Fell, the keeper at Newgate, say that Mister Berningham’s wife would visit him at five of the clock?”
“He did. I confess I had quite forgotten that.”
Newton smiled thinly. “Evidently your mind has been much preoccupied with other, frivolous matters. Now then, if I may have your full attention, sir. You and I will repair to Newgate and while I question Scotch Robin and John Hunter—it may be that they were not the only two rogues employed by the Mint who could have stolen a golden guinea die—you shall keep vigilant for this Mrs. Berningham; and seeing her, follow her, for doubtless her husband will have kept his place of lodging secret.”
We made our way to Newgate, where my master, being recognised from one of the upper storey windows, and much hated among the prisoners for his great diligence, was obliged to dodge a bole of shit that was thrown at him, and with such adroitness that I did perceive how, for all his fifty-four years, he was a most athletic man when the occasion demanded it. Entering at the gate, he made light of the ordure bole, saying that it was as well that it had been an apple that fell on this head and not a turd, otherwise he should never have thought of his theory of universal gravitation, for he would have had nothing in his head but shit.
Berningham was in quod on the Master’s Side, which consisted of thirteen wards, each as big as a chapel, and here I loitered on a wooden bench outside the door that held Berningham, like any common cull or warder. While there I was solicited by two or three of the whores that plied their trade in the prison; and sometimes by one of the children who lived there—a small, almost toothless boy that offered to sell me a newspaper that was several days old, and to fetch me some “washing and lodging,” which was another name the occupants of that terrible place did have for gin. Finally I took pity on the lad and gave him a halfpenny for his enterprise, which was at least more bearable than that of the jades who offered me a threepenny upright in some quiet corner of the Whit. All of this I bore until the cull I had garnished with another coin tipped me the wink that a most hand some-looking woman—although she wore a vizard—whom he admitted to her husband’s ward, was the lady in question. To keep her observed was no great skill, for over her grey moire suit she wore a thickly wadded cloak of bright red cloth that made her stand out like a cardinal in a Quaker church.
Mrs. Berningham stayed with her husband for more than an hour, after which, and hiding her face again, she left the ward and returned to the main gate, with me skulking after her as if I were some Italian in a tragedy of revenge. By and by we both found ourselves out of the Whit again, whither she walked south down Old Bailey, and again I followed her, whereupon, to my surprise, I found my master fall into step beside me, for he was an even better skulker than might be supposed of one who had become so famous.
“Is that Mrs. Berningham?” he asked.
“The same,” I replied. “But what of Scotch Robin and John Hunter? Did you question them?”
“I left them both with much food for thought,” said Newton. “I said that as ever I hope to see heaven I would make certain each of them would meet the cheat before Wednesday if they did not tell me who might have stolen a die. I shall return tomorrow for an answer. For I have always thought that if a man does but reflect upon the prospect of hanging for one night, it greatly loosens his tongue.”
Mrs. Berningham remained very visible in her red hooded cloak, although it was become quite dark and mighty cold besides, which made us glad to hurry after her as she turned east onto Ludgate Hill, for we had no wish to let her out of our sight. But then, turning the corner ourselves, we saw that Mrs. Berningham was surrounded by three ruffians carrying cudgels in their hands, and who seemed to speak very roughly to her, so that I feared they intended to do her some harm. And I shouted at the fellow to desist. At this the villain who was the largest and most ruffianly aspected of the three advanced on me brandishing his cudgel most menacingly.
“I can see that you need a little mortifying, gentlemen,” he growled, “to help you to remember to mind your business.”
I drew the two German double-barrelled Wender pistols I kept about my person whenever I went to the Whit,
