buyers had already left. A bookseller from the Pont Neuf opened with a laughable bid. Von Knepper raised his hand, and this was echoed weakly by his competitor. The game continued for no more than three or four amounts, and the book was soon Von Knepper’s for no trouble and little cost. Having been rebound, it was of no antiquarian value. It was only of interest because it was so rare.
I sat down next to Von Knepper as he held the acquisition limply in his hands. All interest had evaporated now that it was his. The hate I expected to see in his eyes when he saw me was in fact something worse: hope. This was no longer a man to be feared but an old man begging forgiveness without knowing why. The last few days had filled his voice with pleading:
“Where’s my daughter?”
“I don’t know. You know very well I had to flee.”
“If it wasn’t you, then who?”
“The abbot’s people?”
“They have me firmly in their grasp; they don’t need my daughter. In any event, she left of her own free will. She could be anywhere in the city now. She doesn’t know a thing about life; she doesn’t know how to work. How will she survive?”
The auction had ended. All of the collectors were leaving, treasures in hand. I followed Von Knepper out.
“I’ll look for your daughter.”
“And what’s your price if you find her?”
“You’re worried about price? I thought all you’d care about now was Clarissa.”
“If the cost for finding my daughter is to give her to you, that’s too high a price. I don’t make those kinds of deals. At most, if you’re patient, I can make you a copy.”
“I’ll look for her first. Then we’ll talk price.”
We had come to the Seine. Von Knepper flipped through the book by the light of the moon, stopping at the engravings, studying the binding.
“At least I directed you to a good deal,” I said by way of goodbye.
“This book? I know it by heart. It doesn’t interest me in the least.”
“Then why did you buy it?”
“To destroy it. The last thing a maker of automatons needs is for this sort of information to get out. Secrets must be kept.”
He threw the book, as far as he could, and it splashed into the river.
The Halifax Gibbet
I looked for Kolm at the courts by the usual method of leaving a message in a basket, which disappeared into one of the upper windows. A crumpled piece of paper was sent back down, telling me to meet him the next night in a classroom at L’ecole de Medecine.
No one stopped me at the iron gate or among the columns. I walked down a corridor that began in half-light and ended in absolute darkness. Kolm was waiting for me, partway down, at the bottom of some stairs. All around him were large portraits of famous doctors; despite the stains on his overcoat, it was as if posterity had rubbed off on Kolm as well.
He gestured for me to be quiet, and I followed him, up stairs and down halls, to a room with piles of murky jars, wax sculptures of sections of the brain, and skeletons enveloped in cobwebs.
Kolm sat down at a long table, covered in dozens of yellowing sheets containing the type of meticulous drawings we had become used to in the
Leaning over, studying the diagrams intently, Kolm was so different he seemed like an impostor.
“Why are we meeting here and not in the square? What are you doing at the school of medicine, with these old illustrations?”
“We’re in danger apart, but together we’re dead. Here, in this room, we can talk without fear, without anyone seeing us, away from the machinations of Abbot Mazy. Look at everything around us: old, forgotten things. If a person hides among them, he’ll be forgotten, too.”
“I’m surprised they let you be here. You’re not a doctor or a student.”
“One of the professors has a job only I can do. He wants to put an end to executions that become torture because of incompetent executioners. He’s searching for a machine as perfect as the best executioner, who takes life without evoking tears or screams.”
I looked at the plans more closely and began to understand. A sword, made heavier by an oversized hilt, slid down two vertical rails…
“… until it severs the medulla,” Kolm explained in a pedantic tone I’d never heard him use. “It was invented by a Hungarian engineer, who tried it on his wife. He said it was an accident, but no one believed him, and they executed him with it. It was never used again.”
Kolm rummaged for a sheet that was underneath the others.
“Look at this one. The offender is dressed in metal armor. He looks like a warrior ready for combat-only his enemy is the sky: an electric current travels down from a kite flown through a lightning storm. Death is certain and quick, but the weather isn’t.”
In another illustration was a huge ax that hung like a pendulum over the victim, in this case a woman whose black hair seemed to have a life of its own. A second drawing showed her headless.
“A Spanish invention used by the Inquisition in the sixteenth century. No matter how heavy the ax is, because it cuts on a diagonal, it rarely detaches the head completely. Now I’ll show you my favorite.”
This wasn’t a plan but an old engraving; it showed a simple structure, just two rails that a blade traveled down.
“The Halifax gibbet, used in England in the sixteenth century, apparently with excellent results. I’ve almost decided on this model. It won’t be hard to build: all you need is wood and a blade, and enough lead to make sure it drops fast and hard. If it works, there’ll be no need for executioners; anyone will be able to kill. It’s a shame: us old executioners, with our knowledge and our customs, will disappear forever, replaced by clerks who simply have to pull a rope. We’ll be forgotten, like calligraphers.”
Kolm was already reaching for more diagrams to show me; I had to interrupt his explanations.
“I didn’t come looking for deadly inventions but, rather, advice. Clarissa Von Knepper has disappeared. I told her father I’d find her.”
“And why did you promise him that?”
“There’s something I have to do, and he’s the only one who can help me.”
“Not the bishop again? I hope you don’t find her then.”
Kolm looked behind a statue of Hippocrates, in among anatomical specimens, for a bottle of liquor that he set down in front of me. It was sweet but strong.
“Drink and forget. The work you do is unsavory, and I need an assistant. I promised the doctor he’d have his machine in a few days.”
“How will you test it?”
“There’s never any shortage of volunteers here.”
“I can’t help you, Kolm. I’ve come a long way to finish a job.”
“A job that will finish you. Well, if that’s what you want… But bear in mind, this doctor pays well, and he doesn’t have any significant enemies, yet. Your employer, this Voltaire, on the other hand…”
With a look of disappointment, Kolm turned back to his plans and pulled out a map.
“That’s not a machine; it’s Paris,” I said.
The city was so vast, so full of streets and names, it seemed I’d never find something as small as a woman in it.
“A brotherhood of heretics with ties to smuggling-they called themselves the Syracusans-would use the city in their executions. Whenever they suspected a brother was going to leave the sect, he was sentenced to death, but
