“Value?”

“Power, then. Power to effect computations.”

“You are asking, what are those ideas worth?”

“Yes.”

“That depends on how soon a true Logic Mill can be made. You have not made one, have you?”

“No,” Daniel admitted. “We learned much from making the card-punching organs-”

“We meaning-” and Eliza cocked her head out the window, reminding him of the vacant stalls being pillaged by soldiers and Messengers.

“All right,” Daniel admitted, “the we no longer exists. We have been scattered. It shall be most difficult to re-assemble the we.”

“And the organs are on the bottom of the river.”

“Yes.”

“You have drawings? Plans?”

“Mostly in our heads.”

“Here’s what I would say, then,” Eliza began, “if I were rendering this accompt. The ideas are very good ones. The quality of the work, excellent. However, they are Leibniz’s ideas, and they stand or fall with the Doctor and his reputation. His repute is very low with his House, the House of Hanover, which is now the sovereign power in this Realm. Caroline loves the Doctor, and has tried to effect a reconciliation between him and Sir Isaac, but this came to naught. Even when she is Queen she will have little power to change this-so irreconcilable are Leibniz’s ideas with Newton’s. It would be different if Leibniz’s ideas were useful, but they are not-not yet, not compared to Newton’s. It might be a long time before a Logic Mill can be constructed-a hundred years or more. And so the answer is that it is all devoid of monetary value at this time.”

“Hmm. My life’s work, devoid of value. That’s hard to hear.”

“I am only saying that you’ll never find anyone who’ll give you money for it. But you have a great Prince in the East who is happy to support the work. Ship it all to him. The golden cards, your notes and drawings, all that Enoch Root shipped over from Boston-send it all into the East, where someone values it.”

“Very well. I have been arranging to do just that.”

Eliza had turned away from the window and made Daniel Waterhouse the object of her scrutiny. She had, in fact, quite backed him into a corner. Something had occurred to her just now: a wild idea she did not like very much. “You phant’sy that’s all there is, don’t you? When you, Daniel, speak of your life’s work, the only thing you include in that is what you have done on the Logic Mill.”

Daniel showed empty hands to her. “What else is there?”

“At the very least, there is your son Godfrey, whom you ought to go home and look in on! One child in Boston today is a million descendants at some time in the future.”

“Yes, but in what estate, in what sort of country?”

“That is for you to determine. And setting aside Godfrey-consider all you have done in the year since you received the letter from Princess Caroline!”

“I feel it’s all been a muddle.”

“You have done much for this country. For the Engine for Raising Water by Fire. For the abolition of Slavery. For Newton and Leibniz both, though neither of them might appreciate it.”

“As I said before, ’tis all a muddle to me. But I am a great brooder, and you have given me something to brood on for the rest of my days.”

“Don’t only brood on it, if you please. Work it out. See what you have done.”

“In your rendering of the accompt,” said Daniel, “do you find anything at all in the way of assets?”

“Oh, yes,” Eliza said. “The Engine for Raising Water by Fire shall more than pay for all of the losses that I have complained of.”

“I didn’t feel that you were complaining so much as facing facts,” Daniel said.

“I lose money all the time,” she assured him. “I have spent rather a lot on this Slavery project, and it is only beginning-it’ll take at least as long to do away with Slavery as it will to construct a proper Logic Mill, of that I’m sure.”

“Ah, so I’m no worse than you-very kind of you to say so. What is to be your next project, if I may inquire?”

“As far as this investment is concerned? To cut the losses, liquidate what is to no purpose, and redouble investment in what is actually working: the Engine.”

“It seems very reasonable when you put it that way,” said Daniel, for some reason feeling quite relieved. “If the Engine succeeds, by the way, it will help your Cause, by reducing the demand for slave labor-”

“And yours,” she said, “by supplying motive Power for a Logic Mill. Now you are beginning to understand.”

“As Roger liked to say, ’tis a good thing to be educable.”

“Very well!” she said, and clapped her hands. “But there are details for us to attend to, aren’t there, before we become distracted by these grand schemes?”

“We have a way to keep the cards safe from men of that type,” said Daniel, gesturing with his head in the direction of the authorities sacking the Court.

“I had guessed as much. I was thinking of Friday.”

“Two things are happening on Friday: the Trial of the Pyx, and the Hanging-March,” Daniel reminded her. “Which of them do you mean?”

Eliza got that rueful half-smile again. “Both,” she said simply, “for they are one thing now.”

“Then you and I have arrived at the same conclusion,” Daniel said. “It is between Isaac and Jack. For Jack almost certainly placed base metal in the Pyx. If he testifies to that effect, Newton is absolved, and the currency is upheld.”

“Would there be any way to save Newton, and the Currency, without such testimony from Jack?”

“Wouldn’t it be easier to persuade Jack to testify? That would have the added benefit of saving Jack from execution, supposing a deal could be struck-”

“A very questionable supposition, that,” she pointed out, “and at any rate, I don’t want him to make any such deal. I want him to be executed on Friday.”

Daniel was so dumbfounded by this bald utterance that he kept on talking, like a man who has been shot through the head but keeps walking a stride or two before he crumples. “Er-well-even if that is what you want-why not strike a deal that would give him a quick merciful hanging, at least?”

“The original sentence,” she insisted, “is what I want to be carried out against Jack Shaftoe on Friday.”

“So-” Daniel blinked and shook his head, unable to fathom her placid cruelty. “So you are asking me, is there a way for Newton to triumph, in a Trial of the Pyx, even without testimony from Jack?”

“That is what I am asking you, as a Natural Philosopher.”

“You are asking me, then, if the Trial of the Pyx can be rigged!”

“Good day, Dr. Waterhouse; both of us have many things to tend to before Friday,” said Eliza, and walked out of the room.

I beseech you, Brethren, by the Mercies of God, that you present your Bodies a Living Sacrifice, Holy, Acceptable unto God; which is your Reasonable Service.