The Combinations, page 50
to the Emperor passed into the hands of a shadowy character by the unlikely
name of Jacobus Horczicky, a.k.a. Sinapius, whose moniker was later discovered
(by said W.M. Wojnicz) written inside what Němec knew to be none other than
the Manuscript itself, but which the author of the history — Fr. Benjamin
Lourdes, S.J. — omitted to identify. Němec quickly searched for other
references to Horczicky. At least one appeared in the index of each of the books
on Němec’s desk, though mostly in reference not to the person but to the art of
distilling mustard water (the source of Horczicky’s fame & fortune).* Němec read
back & forth between the various accounts, patching a story together till a
sequence of events became more or less clear. What he gathered was this:
Some time after Horczicky’s untimely death, Georgius Baresch — author
of the “Sphinx” letter — came into possession of a book bearing all essential
resemblance to the Voynich Manuscript &, for reasons unexplained, bequeathed
said book in turn to Johannes Marcus Marci (the university rektor), who in turn
donated it to our good friend Athanasius Kircher. A letter from Marci to
Kircher, relaying Missowsky’s original account, was then found along with the
Manuscript by said W.M. Wojnicz. So far, so good.
With time running out, Němec made another pilgrimage to the card
catalogue. A little while afterwards he was sitting in front of the Transactions of
the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, number , volume (). In it,
starting on page , was a long article entitled “A Preliminary Sketch of the
History of the Roger Bacon Cipher Manuscript,” by Wilfred M. Voynich
himself. It began:
In , I came across a most remarkable collection of preciously illuminated
manuscripts. For many decades these volumes had lain buried in the chests in
which I found them in an ancient castle in Southern Europe, where the
collection had apparently been stored in consequence of the disturbed political
condition of Europe in the early part of the nineteenth century.
While examining the manuscripts, with a view to the acquisition of at least
a part of the collection, my attention was especially drawn by one volume. It was
such an ugly duckling compared with the other manuscripts, with their rich
decorations in gold and colours, that my interest was aroused at once. I found
* Or as the Paddy contingent in Bohemia were wont to regale him, “Ferd de Turd.” [:]
* Mr Mustard, “If you like it Hot, we’ve got your Tot!” [:]
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that it was written entirely in cipher. Even a necessarily brief examination of
the vellum upon which it was written, the calligraphy, the drawings and the
pigments suggested to me as the origin the latter part of the thirteenth century.
The drawings indicated it to be an encyclopaedic work on natural philosophy.
The fact that this was a thirteenth century manuscript in cipher convinced
me that it must be a work of exceptional importance, and to my knowledge the
existence of a manuscript of such an early date written entirely in cipher was
unknown. Two problems immediately presented themselves — the text must be
unravelled and the history of the manuscript must be traced. It was not till some
time after the Manuscript came into my hands that I read the document bearing
the date (or ), which was attached to the front cover. This document,
which is a letter from Johannes Marcus Marci to Athanasius Kircher, making a
gift of the manuscript to him, is of great significance…
On it went. But the more Němec read, the more convinced he became that there
was no way of tracing back from the Voynich Manuscript to the point from
which he’d started out. Namely, Edwarf K. So far, the premise for any
connection at all relied solely on the assumption that Rudolf had purchased the
Manuscript from John D & that the Manuscript itself had originated with
Roger Bacon*: a theory Voynich may’ve chosen to believe but which even Marci
doubted, & which was increasingly at variance with all available facts.
Then, his time running out, Němec found something interesting: a note
by a Renaissance art historian (Nemi, G., for Giuliana) which suggested, on the
basis of the Manuscript’s illustrations, that it (i.e. the Manuscript) most likely
originated between the years & in the Duchy of Bravuria. Němec read
on. Then, leafing through the appendix of the same book ( The Mastery of
Nature: Aspects of Art, Science, and Humanism in the Renaissance, trans. from the
Italian by Daria Anatoly), he found a note by a period expert on botany (Agusta,
P., for Pietro) identifying the style of the herbal drawings in the Manuscript (as
well as the style of the writing itself) as Northern Italian, dating from around
. A similar opinion was expressed by an archivist from Berlin ( The European
Renaissance: Centres and Peripheries, pages -), adding that the last section
of the Manuscript (composed in what appeared to be a mix of Deutsch, Latin &
Voynichese) indicated a mitteleuropäischen origin, circa .
The striking thing about all these guesses (divorced as they seemed to be
from preconceptions about the Manuscript’s authorship & content) was, rather
* Who, incidentally, had also written about cryptography, in his Epistle on Secret Works of Art and of Nature and on the Nullity of Magick (c). [:]
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than discrediting any connection with K, that they offered a more credible, if
still circumstantial, basis for believing K indeed had a hand in the transmission
of the Voynich Manuscript. Němec realised then what he’d unconsciously
overlooked before. In one of those carbon-copy typescripts he’d read back in
April (what was it? Ashmole’s Confiteor? Yes!) there’d been something about K
having been thrown in prison by Rudolf (& here Němec grinned to himself
again) because he was alleged to’ve been in league with a “goldmaker” from
Venice to pull a scam. But Němec remembered there was something else, too.
About how this “goldmaker” was executed by the Duke of Bravuria in Munich.*
Too many coincidences, Němec thought. But how neatly all the pieces fell
into place: a goldmaker from Northern Italy, practicing in Bravuria, in league
with K in Bohemia… Could this have been the real conspiracy, to defraud
Rudolf? The concocting of the Voynich Manuscript?
He had only minutes to search the catalogue for Ashmole’s Confiteor,
there’d been three volumes, but none of the cards was in the places he looked. A
voice crackled over a loudspeaker, announcing that the library was closing.
Němec hurriedly searched through a dozen other sets of drawers, but to no avail,
aware that the Reading Room was quickly emptying around him. He began to
feel desperate. He was sure something essential was almost within his grasp & it
was slipping away. Where were those bloody cards? He heard footsteps behind him
& then a voice. It was the librarian with the bifocals.
‘You have to leave now,’ he said in a dull monotone.
Němec, in a fever of exhaustion, began to explain about the missing cards,
but the staring lopsided eyes unnerved him.
‘You have to leave now,’ the monotone repeated.
There was no point debating. Němec went back to his desk, shuffled his
notes into a pile & stuffed them into the bag with the Black Book. All the while
the librarian watched him. Němec could feel his eyes follow him across the room
to the heavy black door. Outside, the corridor was deserted. The sound of his
walkingstick echoed. Behind him, one by one, the overhead lights were being
switched off.
* On the th of April , as it happens. [:]
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d. The King of the Magicians
25
___________
THE CARETAKER
Hard blue porcelain, the sky — halfmoon over the rooftops.
At that time of day, late morning, Jánský Vršek was as quiet as any dead-
end street can be. The old white house was exactly as Němec remembered it. He
found the caretaker sitting in the courtyard, a heavily embroidered shawl draped
across her shoulders, knitting. She was a small, spinsterish old lady, with
pearlgrey hair drawn back tightly into a bun. A large rhinestone broach was
pinned at her throat above a white lace collar. Her hands were restless,
fineboned, tapering to heavily varnished fingernails. On a small table beside her
stood a china tea set & a tall glass of dark rum. There were tea leaves spread out
on a saucer, as though waiting to be read. Behind her, through the doorway to
her caretaker’s flat, an old green parrot perched on a stand, craning its head. The
caretaker’s name was on the doorbell by the front entrance:
‘Mrs Severínová?’
The old lady gazed at him quizzically, over a pair of round wireframe
glasses. The parrot craned its neck further. Němec felt its black eye fixing on him,
as it waited & watched. The old woman put down her knitting but said nothing.
‘I knew Professor Hájek. I used to visit him, before he died.’
The old woman’s lips twisted into something that might’ve been a smile.
‘You seem very sure of yourself, young man.’
Němec grinned back at her, foolishly, unable to think of anything to say.
‘Sit with me,’ she said finally, indicating a low wooden chair leaning
against the courtyard wall.
The green parrot watched closely as Němec brought the chair over & sat
down beside the table, pointed knees sticking up awkwardly.
‘Would you care for some tea? It was Tomáš’s favourite. From Yunan
province, in China. The famous six mountains. Do you know China at all? It is a
very large country with an ancient culture, much more ancient than our own.
Here,’ she said, pouring a reddishbrown liquid into an empty cup.
Němec didn’t care for any tea but it was better to humour the old lady.
The tea, he noticed, had gone cold in the pot. She waited for him to taste it — it
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tasted like brackish water rinsed through straw & crushed brick. The old woman
saw him wince & let her smile play out into the type of enlightened grin you see
in pictures of Sri Chinmoy. The parrot faintly cackled.
‘An acquired taste, perhaps.’
Němec tried to balance the cup on one of his knees, thought better of it,
& placed it on the edge of the table. Severínová watched all this with an
appearance equally of bemusement & indifference. She leant back in her
armchair & removed her glasses.
‘For the ancient Chinese,’ she said, polishing her lenses with the hem of
her shawl, ‘tea symbolised harmony, calm &… Oh yes, yes, most importantly of
all, optimism. The drinking of tea often involved certain rituals, which were
meant to represent the balance & proper ordering of the universe. Their
philosophy, do you know, preceded the birth of Christ by more than fifteen
hundred years. The Christians, being Romans rather than Israelites, professed a
greater liking for wine, to symbolise the union of body & spirit. The Romans, of
course, learned the making of wine from the Celts. Our own land was first
settled by the Celts, you know. A thousand years before the Sklavs first
wandered from the shores of their Bleak Sea.’
The old lady’s smile began to wane. She repositioned her glasses on the
bridge of her nose, her faded eyes growing larger behind the lenses. Němec
wondered what the history lesson was leading to.
‘We don’t normally expect visitors, nowadays. Do we, Gawaine?’
The parrot shook its head from side to side, ruffling its feathers, then
went back to eyeballing their visitor, its beak soundlessly open, the shadow of a
grublike tongue moving inside. Němec couldn’t quite put his finger on what the
old women’s strange conversation reminded him of…
‘Finish your tea,’ she snapped.
Němec did so, trying to keep from swallowing the leaves, & immediately
she snatched the cup away from him & began scrutinising the dregs at the bottom
of it. Němec sat there uncomfortably watching her. It had been his intention to
ask about the Prof’s, but seeing the way the caretaker was poking around at the tea
leaves didn’t make him feel overly optimistic. While she poked she began to hum,
& presently she spoke without, however, taking her eyes from the leaves.
‘It seems to me everything has to be the way it is & no other way.’
Němec wasn’t sure he’d heard her rightly & leant forward with his eyes
grown wider, as if either would help him hear any better now that she’d gone
silent again. Aware of how foolish he must’ve looked, he straightened up & cast
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around for a new angle of approach. The parrot sneered. Ignoring it, Němec
began to explain his relationship with the Prof, but the old lady cut him off.
‘I know all about that,’ she said.
Němec gathered there were probably a great number of things La
Severínová knew. Just then she fixed him with a cold stare & said —
‘Why don’t you go up there, since that’s what you came for? The keys are
on the hook beside the stove.’
Němec stared at her uncomprehendingly.
‘Well, what are you waiting for?’
The old woman seemed to know his mind better than he did. Maybe, he
thought, that was what he’d really come for after all. The house with its unholy
spirits, the magic Tower, the child of legend with the ears of a donkey.
Astrologers & asses.
‘Doesn’t anyone live there?’
‘Not since Tomáš passed & that dreadful thing happened.’
People, he supposed, were probably a bit squeamish about moving into a
place like that, tainted by unnatural death. That’s what they’d think. As if
anything that happened in this city could be called natural. The old woman
waved at him impatiently so he stood up & went to get the keys — they were
hanging on a hook beside the stove, just as she said they would, on a ring with
the unmysterious letters T.H. monographed on a faded disc of black leather.
Němec felt the cold weight of the keys in his hand & shuddered slightly, as if he
was holding the mystery & banality of other people’s lives in some kind of
balance. Then something moved behind him & he swung around in alarm to
find the green parrot stretching its neck out towards him from the top of the
pantry, hissing.
‘Gawaine!’ the old woman snapped.
The parrot fixed Němec with one of its black eyes & didn’t move. Němec
edged away from it towards the door. Its malevolent gaze followed him. Evil
thing that it was. Once Němec crossed the threshold of the doorstep the parrot
lost all interest in him. It puffed its feathers & drew in its neck, lidding its eye.
‘I don’t remember the parrot.’
‘Gawaine?’ the caretaker looked surprised. ‘He was Alžběta’s pet. She
bought him, oh, I can’t remember when, at an exposition, at the Botanic
Gardens. Funny, you wouldn’t think they’d put a bird like that up for sale, at the
Botanic Gardens. It was Gawaine who alerted us, by his screeching, when she…
you know, had her accident. He’s very protective, the unfortunate creature. It’s
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said they choose their mates for life. In Gawaine’s mind, Alžběta belonged to
him & he defended his claim against all competition. Even Tomáš, poor man.
She had to keep him locked in her room. Gawaine, I mean. Well, you can just
imagine…’
Mrs Severínová cackled quietly to herself.
‘Come. Give me your arm. I’ll show you the apartment.’
The caretaker pulled herself up out of her chair & balanced herself with
her hand on Němec’s right shoulder. He offered her his stick but she waved it
away. Taking the keys from him, she beckoned him to follow her & started out
across the courtyard to the Tower. The stairs weren’t steep, but she climbed
them with difficulty, gripping the handrail. Rheumatism, she explained.
‘As you can see, I don’t come in here very often.’
The door to the Prof’s apartment was as nondescript as ever. Inside, the
air was heavy with mustification. Němec sniffed at it apprehensively, the smell of
detergent, plasterer’s paint, stale cigarette smoke. The walls, he could see, had
been partly repainted & the fireplaces blocked-up. There were vague outlines
along the edges of the parquetry where previously a bookshelf, or a cabinet, or
