A Star Shall Fall

The answer came in the form of a gesture toward a man Galen remembered from his first Royal Society meeting. Once again he stood in conversation with Lord Macclesfield, who was president of both societies. “You are the son of Lord Charles Cavendish?”

A nod. Galen glanced fleetingly at Dr. Andrews, perplexed by the other’s silence. But his companion was distracted. “Ah, Mr. Franklin! Good to see you again. Hadley was telling me your thoughts on evaporation—”

When everyone sat down to dinner, Galen found himself with Andrews on one side and Henry Cavendish on the other, with Franklin—who, it transpired, was a Society Fellow visiting from the colonies—across the table. His conversation with Andrews had moved on to electricity, about which Galen knew very little. While the waiter brought out the first course, Galen addressed himself to the challenge of drawing Cavendish into conversation. “Your father is the Vice President of the Royal Society, I believe. Do you have an interest in natural philosophy as well?”

Another nod, as the fellow piled his plate high with pheasant, cod, and pork. What was it going to take, to make him open his mouth? Perhaps it was simple snobbery; if Galen remembered lineages correctly, Henry Cavendish was the grandson of not one but two dukes. On the other hand, it was hard to ascribe snobbery to a man so shabbily dressed; his coat, to choose but one example, was not only plain but frayed at the cuffs and collar.

Faced with the prospect of eating in silence, or else of ignoring his companion to join in conversation elsewhere, Galen opted for a third course of action: he began to talk about whatever came into his head, with frequent pauses that invited Cavendish to contribute. Taking his cues from those around him, he kept his focus on matters philosophical, but within those constraints he gave his curiosity free rein. From Lord Charles’s work on thermometers he went on to something Franklin had said about electricity, and thence to astronomy, which—as it always did—led his tongue to fire.

“It’s a topic of great interest to me,” Galen admitted. Somehow he’d managed to empty his wineglass, wetting his throat; he would have to be more careful, lest he inadvertently make a drunken fool of himself. “I’m fascinated by an account I just read of the work done by a German, Georg Stahl—do you know of it?” He paused for the now expected nod. “I’d never considered that the calcination of metals and the combustion of wood might be the same thing, the release of phlogiston from the material. And who says it ends there? After all, the transmission of electrical fluid can cause fires, as lightning strikes have shown; perhaps that fluid is phlogiston in pure form, or at least contains it in high proportion.”

With the general chatter filling the room, Galen almost didn’t hear the response. “If it w—if it w—” Cavendish stopped and tried again, with better success. “If it were pure phlogiston, we should expect to see electricity leap into the air as a log burns.”

It was two answers in one: a refutation of his notion, and an explanation for why Henry Cavendish had not opened his mouth before. The gentleman’s high-pitched voice squeaked like a nervous girl’s, and strain showed in his eyes and jaw as he forced himself past the awkward pauses.

Galen felt instant remorse for having thought the man a snob. Nothing could change that unfortunate voice, but surely a gathering of this sort, filled with strangers and free-flowing conversation, made his stammer worse. No wonder Cavendish was quiet.

Having achieved the tiniest bit of success, though, Galen was not about to abandon the effort. “I suppose that’s true. I confess, I’ve only just encountered Stahl’s phlogiston theory; a friend gave me the book last week.” One benefit to Cavendish’s reticence; he wouldn’t ask about the friend, and therefore Galen wouldn’t have to come up with a lie with which to disguise Wilhas von das Ticken. “Have you done any experiments on the matter?”

The conflicted expression in Cavendish’s eyes was familiar to Galen: a profound desire to indulge in his passion, warring against an equally profound reluctance to speak of it. Their respective situations might be very different, but the result looked remarkably similar.

“Hard to do,” Cavendish finally mumbled, after another excruciating set of attempts to get the words out. “Need to isolate phlogiston. Might be able to do it with iron filings and acid—Boyle’s experiment. Drive the phlogiston out of the metal and ca—and ca—”

Galen stopped himself just short of saying “capture it.” Interrupting someone of Cavendish’s stature would be rude in the extreme. Besides, even as the words formed in his mind, the association they called up startled him so badly he dropped his fork. Perhaps it’s already been captured.

Captured—and exiled to a comet.