Frow Widow Apterhots, however, clearly did not regard the results as in any way questionable. Her sallow, silly face now quite blissful, she stepped forward and retrieved the crucifix. “Emyil,” she said, “was always so strong . . . !”
And on that note she departed.
Herr Manfred Mauswarmer at the Austro-Hungarian Legation was quite interested. “‘Novotny in Prague,’ eh? Hmmm, that seems to ring a bell.” Third ASO Lupescus sat up straighter. A faint tingle of excitement went through his scalp. “Yes, yes,” said Herr Mauswarmer, “we have of a certainty heard the name. One of those Czech names,” he said, almost indulgently. “One never knows what they may be up to.” Very carefully he made a neat little note and looked up brightly. “We shall of course first have to communicate with Vienna—”
“Oh, of course!”
“And they will, of course, communicate with Prague.”
Herr Manfred Mauswarmer’s large, pale, bloodshot blue eyes blinked once or twice. “A Czech name,” he noted. “An English name. Uses the code cypher Wizard. Communicates in French.” He briefly applied one thick forefinger to the side of his nose. He winked. Lupescus winked back. They understood each other. The hare had had a headstart. But the hounds had caught the scent.
One of the bell jars was empty – had, in fact, always been empty, although Eszterhazy had merely noted this without considering as to why it might be so. He did not ask about it as he listened, now, to the Englishman’s talk. Milord Sir Smiht, his cap on his head, his cloak sometimes giving a dramatic flap as he turned in his pacings of the large old room, said, “The contents of the vessels in large part represent the vegetable and mineral kingdom – I don’t know if you have noticed that.”
“I have.”
“The animal kingdom, now . . . well, each man and woman is a microcosm, representing the macrocosm, the universe, in miniature. That is to say, we contain in our own bodies enough of the animal and mineral to emanate at all times, though we are not aware of it, a certain amount of odyllic force—”
“Or forces.”
“Or forces. Point well made. However. Now, although the average human body does include, usually, some amounts of the vegetable kingdom – so much potato, cabbage, sprouts, let us say – undergoing the process of digestive action,” flap went his cloak, “as well as the ever-present bacteria, also vegetative, still. The chemical constituencies in our body, now, I forget just what they amount to. Four-and-six, more or less, in real money. Or is it two-and-six? One forgets. Still. Primarily, the human organism is an animal organism.” Flap.
Eszterhazy, nodding, made a steeple of his hands. “And therefore (Pemberton Smith will correct me if I am wrong), when the human subject takes hold of that pair of metallic grips, the three kingdoms, animal, vegetable, and mineral, come together in a sort of unity—”
“A sort of Triune Monarchy in parvo, as it were, yes, correct! I see that I was not wrong in assuming that yours was a mind capable of grasping these matters,” flap, “and then it is all a matter of adjustment: One turns up the vegetative emanations, one turns in the mineral emanations . . . and then, then, my dear sir, one hopes for the best. For one has not as yet been able to adjust the individual human beings. They are what they are. One can turn a tap, one can open a valve or lose a valve, plug in a connecting tube or unplug a connecting tube. But one has to take a human body just as one finds it . . . Pity, in a way . . . Hollo, hollo!”
Something was happening in the empty bell jar: mists and fumes, pale blue lights, red sparks and white sparks.
Milord Sir Smiht, dashing hither and thither and regulating his devices, stopped, suddenly, looked imploringly at Eszterhazy, gestured, and said, “Would you, my dear fellow? Awf’ly grateful—”
Eszterhazy sat in the chair, took the metal grips in his hands, and tried to emulate those curious animals, the mules, which, for all that they are void of hope of posterity, can still manage to look in two directions at once.
Direction Number One: Pemberton Smith, as he coupled and uncoupled, attached and disattached, turned, tightened, loosened, adjusting the ebb and flow of the odyllic forces. Animal, vegetable, and mineral.
Direction Number Two: The once-empty bell jar, wherein now swarmed . . . wherein now swarmed what? A hive of microscopic bees, perhaps.
A faint tingle passed through the palms of Eszterhazy’s hands and up his hands and arms. The tingle grew stronger. It was not really at all like feeling an electrical current, though. A perspiration broke forth upon his forehead. He felt very slightly giddy, and the wizard anglais almost at once perceived this. “Too strong for you, is it? Sorry about that!” He made adjustments. The giddiness was at once reduced, almost at once passed away.
And the something in the bell jar slowly took form and shape.
It was a simulacrum, perhaps. Or perhaps the word was homunculus. The bell jar was the size of a child. And the man within it was the size of a rather small child. Otherwise it was entirely mature. And “it” was really not the correct pronoun, for the homunculus (or whatever it was) was certainly a man, however smalclass="underline" a man wearing a frock coat and everything which went with frock coats, and a full beard. He even had an order of some sort, a ribbon which crossed his bosom, and a medal or medallion. Eszterhazy thought, but could not be sure, that it rather resembled the silver medallion which Milord Sir Smiht wore in his hat.
“Pemberton Smith, who is that?”
“Who, that? Or. Oh, that’s Gomes—” He pronounced it to rhyme with roams. “He’s the Wizard of Brazil. You’ve heard of Gomes, to be sure.” And he then proceeded to move his arms, hands, and fingers with extreme rapidity, pausing only to say, “We communicate through the international sign language, you see. He has no English and I have no Portagee. Poor old Gomes, things have been ever so slack for him since poor old Dom Peedro got the sack. Ah well. Inevitable, I suppose. Emperors and the Americas just don’t seem to go together. Purely an Old World phenomena, don’t you know.” And once again his fingers and hands and arms began their curious, rapid, and impressive movement. “Yes, yes,” he muttered to himself. “I see, I see. No. Really. You don’t say. Ah, too bad, too bad!”
He turned to Eszterhazy. Within the jar, the tiny digits and limbs of the Wizard of Brazil had fallen, as it were, silent. The homunculus shrugged, sadly. “What do you make of all that?” asked the Wizard of England (across the waters).
“What? Is it not clear? The ants are eating his coffee trees, and he wishes you to send him some paris green, as the local supply has been exhausted.”
“My dear chap, I can’t send him any paris green!”
“Assure him that I shall take care of it myself. Tomorrow.”
“I say, that is ever so good of you! Yes, yes, ah, pray excuse me now whilst I relay the good news.”
In far-off Petropolis, the summer capital of Brazil, the wizard of that mighty nation, much reduced in size (wizard, not nation) by transatlantic transmission, crossed his arms upon his bosom and bowed his gratitude in the general direction of the distant though friendly nation of Scythia-Pan-nonia-Transbalkania. All men of science, after all, constitute one great international confraternity.