“Of embarrassment, most likely,” hissed the Earl of Upnor.

A chirurgeon, looking deeply nervous and out of his depth, was chivvied up to the front of the room. It was a big room, this. Its owner, the Duke of Gunfleet, perhaps too much under the spell of his architect, insisted on calling it the Grand Salon. This was simply French for Big Big Room; but it seemed a little bigger, and ever so much grander, when the French nomenclature was used.

Even under the humble appellation of Big Big Room, it was a bit too big and too grand for the chirurgeon. “Fifty seconds!-?” he said.

There was a difficult interlude, lasting much longer than fifty seconds, as a helpful Fellow tried to explain the idea of fifty seconds to the chirurgeon, who had got stuck on the misconception that they were speaking of 1Z52s-perhaps some idiom from the gambling world?

“Think of minutes of longitude,” someone called out from the back of the Big Big Room. “One sixtieth of that sort of a minute is called what?”

“A second of longitude,” said the chirurgeon.

“By analogy, then, one sixtieth of a minute of time is-”

“A second… of time,” said the chirurgeon; then was suddenly mortified as he ran through some rough calculations in his head.

“One thirty-six-hundredth of an hour,” called out a bored voice with a French accent.

“Time’s up!” announced Boyle, “Let us move on-”

“The good doctor may have another fifty seconds,” Anglesey ruled.

“Thank you, my lord,” said the chirurgeon, and cleared his throat. “Perhaps those gentlemen who have been the patrons of Mr. Hooke’s horologickal researches, and are now the beneficiaries of his so ingenious handiwork, will be so kind as to keep me informed, during my presentation of the results of Lord Chester’s post-mortem, as to the passage of time-”

“I accept that charge-you have already spent twenty seconds!” said the Earl of Upnor.

“Please, Louis, let us show due respect for our Founder, and for this Doctor,” said his father.

“It seems too late for the former, Father, but I assent to the latter.”

“Hear, hear!” Boyle said. This made the chirurgeon falter-but John Comstock stiffened him up with a look.

“Most of Lord Chester’s organs were normal for a man of his age,” the chirurgeon said. “In one kidney I found two small stones. In the ureter, some gravel. Thank you.”

The chirurgeon sat down very hastily, like an infantryman who has just seen puffs of smoke bloom from the powder-pans of opposing muskets. Buzzing and droning filled the room-suddenly it was like one of Wilkins’s glass apiaries, and the chirurgeon a boy who’d poked it with a stick. But the Queen Bee was dead, and there was disagreement as to who was going to be stung.

“It is what I suspected-there was no stoppage of urine,” Hooke finally announced, “only pain from small kidney-stones. Pain that induced Lord Chester to take solace in opiates.”

Which was as good as flinging a glass of water in the face of Monsieur LeFebure. The King’s Chymist stood up. “To have given comfort to the Lord Bishop of Chester in his time of need is the greatest honor of my career,” he said. “It would be an infamous shame if any of those other medicines he took, led to his demise.”

Now a great deal more buzzing, in a different key. Roger Comstock stood up and cut through it: “If Mr. Pepys would be so kind as to show us his stone…”

Pepys fairly erupted to his feet across the room and shoved a hand into a pregnant pocket.

John Comstock sent both men back down with cast-iron eyes. “It would not be a kindness, Mr., er, Comstock, as we’ve all seen it.”

Daniel’s turn. “Mr. Pepys’s stone is colossal-yet he was able to urinate a little. Considering the smallness of the urinary passages, is it not possible that a small stone might block urine as well as a large one-and perhaps better?”

No more buzzing now, but a deep general murmur-the point was awarded, by acclamation, to Daniel. He sat down. Roger Comstock ejaculated compliments all over him.

“I’ve had stones in the kidney,” Anglesey said, “and I will testify that the pain is beyond description.”

John Comstock: “Like something meted out by the Popish Inquisition?”

“I cannot make out what is going on,” said Daniel, quietly, to his neighbor.

“Well, you’d best make it out before you say anything else,” Roger said. “Just a suggestion.”

“First Anglesey and Comstock are united in disgracing Wilkins’s memory-then next moment, at each other’s throats over religion.”

“Where does that put you, Daniel?” Roger asked.

Anglesey, unruffled: “I’m sure I speak for the entire Royal Society in expressing unbounded gratitude to Monsieur LeFebure for easing Lord Chester’s final months.”

“The Elixir Proprietalis LeFebure is greatly admired at Court-even among young ladies who are not afflicted with exquisitely painful disorders,” said John Comstock. “Some of them like it so well that they have started a new fashion: going to sleep, and never waking up again.”

The conversation had now taken on the semblance of a lawn-tennis match played with sputtering granadoes. There was a palpable shifting of bodies and chairs as Fellows of the R.S. aligned themselves for spectation. Monsieur LeFebure caught Comstock’s lob with perfect aplomb: “It has been known since ancient times that syrup of poppies, in even small doses, cripples the judgment by day and induces frightful dreams by night -would you not agree?”

Here John Comstock, sensing a trap, said nothing. But Hooke answered, “I can attest to that.”

“Your dedication to Truth is an example to us all, Mr. Hooke. In large doses, of course, the medicine kills. The first symptom-destruction of judgment-can lead to the second -death by over-dosing. That is why the Elixir Proprietalis LeFebure should only be administered under my supervision-and that is why I have personally taken pains to visit Lord Chester several times each week, during the months that his judgment was crippled by the drug.”

Comstock was annoyed by LeFebure’s resilience. But (as Daniel realized too late) Comstock had another goal in sight besides denting LeFebure’s reputation, and it was a goal that he shared with Thomas More Anglesey-normally his rival and enemy. A look passed between these two.

Daniel stood. Roger got a grip on his sleeve, but was not in a position to reach his tongue. “I saw Lord Chester several times in his final weeks and saw no evidence that his mental faculties were affected! To the contrary-”

“Lest someone come away with the foolish opinion that you are being unkind, Monsieur LeFebure,” Anglesey said-shooting a glare at Daniel-“did Lord Chester not consider this mental impairment a fair price to pay for the opportunity to spend a few last months with his family?”

“Oh, he paid that price gladly, ” Monsieur LeFebure said.

“I collect that this is why we’ve heard so little from him in the way of Natural Philosophy of late-” Comstock said.

“Yes-and it is why we should overlook any of his more recent, er…”

“Indiscretions?”

“Enthusiasms?”

“Impulsive ventures into the lower realm of politics -”

“His mental powers dimmed-his heart was as pure as ever-and sought solace in well-meaning gestures.”

That was all the poisoned eulogies Daniel could stand to hear-then he was out in the garden of Gunfleet House watching a white marble mermaid vomit an endless stream of clear babble into a fish-pond. Roger Comstock was right behind him.

There were marble benches a-plenty, but he could not sit. Rage had taken him. Daniel was not especially susceptible to that passion. But he understood, now, why the Greeks had believed that Furies were angels of a sort, winged-swift, armed with whips and torches, rushing up out of Erebus to goad men unto madness. Roger, watching Daniel pace around the garden, might have convinced himself that his friend’s wild lunges and strides were being provoked by invisible lashes, and that his face had been scorched by torches.