An Elegant Solution(110)

“I’m certain,” Daniel said.

The Provost was seated at the front, between Deans, talking with Theology and Law. He noticed me, in the midreaches, and nodded. It was my payment for being his courier. The three committees were also represented by their leaders. Master Johann alone wasn’t leaning to his neighbor and whispering, and nodding. The bell in the Munster rang and it was time to begin.

Some things were ritual and some were not. The convening of the University was. The announcement of its candidates was not. The dignity of so many Chairs in one room made the occasion momentous, but the moment was brief. “Gentlemen!” the Provost said and the room quickly was silent. “The report of the committees appointed to nominate candidates for the vacant Chair of Physics. Master Gottlieb?”

Daniel went rigid. But I heard words escaping from his clenched teeth.

“The Brute’s outdone this time. He’ll have a taste of what it’s like. There’s no chance he’s got around me now. If only I could see his face . . .”

Gottlieb said, “We nominate Master Staehelin.”

Daniel shuddered. “What? No. Not him!” A quiet storm of murmurings rose immediately, approving and unexcited. Master Staehelin had been the lecturer in Physics for a decade and was a very competent scientist. He seemed an obvious candidate. Daniel’s reaction was mixed of contempt and suspicion. “That’s no surprise. He’s a plain choice.”

“He’s a good choice,” I said. “I’ve heard him lecture. He’s able and he’s diligent.”

“He’s a distraction, a trick. Brutus has higher plans for Physics than a plain, diligent lecturer.” Daniel was speaking to himself. “He needs two other nominees besides the man he’s picked for the Chair. That’s all Staehelin is.”

Staehelin himself had turned white. He was across the room from us in about the same row. He was a plain man, as Daniel said, about forty and probably not with the ambition to expect a Chair. But he’d take it, of course. His white turned to red and his dropped open mouth turned to a grin, and hands near him reached, discretely, to shake his. Daniel might have been right, that his candidature was only a ploy, but seeing his surprise and gratitude, I hoped for him that he’d be successful.

He made his way to the front of the room, and it was a slow journey across his row to the aisle and down the steps. He was obviously still surprised, even to stumbling as he reached the front. Then he waited, for the Provost was unlocking the casket.

Around his neck, on a long and thin but sturdy chain, the Provost had the key. The casket, resting quietly on the lectern, was a foot long, and less wide and tall, and pure black. The keyhole was the only mark on it; even the hinges were inside and unseen. The key was small, about an inch, and solid. I could tell from its weight on the chain, and how the Provost held it, that it was heavy for being small. It went into the hole and turned with effort. The lid was opened.

From the casket, the Provost lifted a wood tray.

“Master Staehelin?” the Provost said. “Please choose a stone.”

He looked at the offered tray. On it were the seven stones, each with its emblem. It didn’t seem that there was anything important to him in his choice, which the Ars Conjectandi, of course, said there was not. Each would be equal. He took the center.

“This one,” he said, hoarsely.

“Master Staehelin has chosen the Tree,” the Provost said. Also on the tray were three blank stones of the same sizes. He took one of these in one hand and the chosen stone from Staehelin in his other hand. Heidelmann, the Provost’s student clerk, had a bar of sealing wax and a candle, and he held them over the two stones, dripping wax on them both. The Provost pushed them together and they became a sealed cube. The wax was held entirely within the carving of the emblem and none extruded to the outside, so the cube was perfect and without blemish.

The Provost set the cube into the black casket. Staehelin clambered back to his seat. The Provost waited. Then he said, “Master Desiderius?”

“Maybe it’s Desiderius you’re waiting for,” Nicolaus said.

“No,” Daniel said. “It must be the Brute himself! Oh, that’ll be everything!”

We only saw Master Desiderius’s back. Master Johann’s face was also forward and unseen to us. Desiderius stood and just said, in a voice that was dry and carved in stone, “We have nominated Master Daniel.”

Too much happened at that for me to see it all. Of course Daniel popped like a squeezed melon. I felt him beside me. But I also tried to see any expression from his father, any motion from his shoulders or back. He did react, with a slight but sudden lean and twist of his head, like he was having trouble hearing. Or maybe it was something else. But he didn’t turn.