TWO- THE IDEA OF NORTH-1

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    “Master,” said Lord Asriel. “Yes, Im back. D in yuests; Ive got something very iing to show you.”

    “Lord Asriel,” said the Master heavily, and came forward to shake his hand. From her hiding place Lyra watched the Masters eyes, and ihey flicked toward the table for a sed, where the Tokay had been.

    “Master,” said Lord Asriel. “I came too late to disturb your dinner, so I made myself at home in here. Hello, Sub-Rectlad to see you looking so well.

    Excuse my rough appearance; Ive only just landed. Yes, Master, the Tokays gone. I think youre standing in it. The Porter k off the table, but it was my fault. Hello, Chaplain. I read your latest paper with great i.”

    He moved away with the Chaplain, leaving Lyra with a clear view of the Masters face. It was impassive, but the daemon on his shoulder was shuffling her feathers and movilessly from foot to foot. Lord Asriel was already dominating the room, and although he was careful to be courteous to the Master in the Masters owory, it was clear where the power la<var>藏书网</var>y.

    The Schreeted the visitor and moved into the room, some sitting around the table, some in the armchairs, and soon a buzz of versation filled the air. Lyra could see that they were powerfully intrigued by the wooden case, the s, and the lantern. She khe Scholars well: the Librarian, the Sub-Rector, the Enquirer, and the rest; they were men who had been around her all her life, taught her, chastised her, soled her, given her little presents, chased her away from the fruit trees in the garden; they were all she had for a family. They might even have felt like a family if she knew what a family was, though if she did, shed have been more likely to feel that about the College servants. The Scholars had more important things to do than attend to the affes of a half-wild, half-civilized girl, left among them by ce.

    The Master lit the spirit lamp uhe little silver chafing dish aed some butter before cutting half a dozen poppy heads open and tossing them in.

    Poppy was always served after a feast: it clarified the mind and stimulated the tongue, and made for rich versation. It was traditional for the Master to cook it himself.

    Uhe sizzle of the frying butter and the hum of talk, Lyra shifted around to find a more fortable position for herself. With enormous care she took one of the robes—a full-length fur—off its hanger and laid it on the floor of the wardrobe.

    “You should have used a scratchy old one,” whispered Pantalaimon. “If you get too fortable, youll go to sleep.”

    “If I do, its your job to wake me up,” she replied.

    She sat and listeo the talk. Mighty dull talk it was, too; almost all of it politics, and London politics at that, nothiing about Tartars. The smells  poppy and smoke-leaf drifted pleasantly in through the wardrobe door, and more than once Lyra found herself nodding. But finally she heard someone rap oable. The voices fell silent, and then the Master spoke.

    “Gentlemen,” he said. “I feel sure I speak for all of us when I bid Lord Asriel wele. His visits are rare but always immensely valuable, and I uand he has something of particular io show us tonight. This is a time of high political tension, as we are all aware; Lord Asriels presence is required early tomorrow m in White Hall, and a train is waiting with steam up ready to carry him to London as soon as we have finished our versation here; so we must use our time wisely. When he has finished speaking to us, I imagihere will be some questions. Please keep them brief and to the point. Lord Asriel, would you like to begin?”

    “Thank you, Master,” said Lord Asriel. “To start with, I have a few slides to show you. Sub-Rector, you  see best from here, I think. Perhaps the Master would like to take the chair he wardrobe?”

    Lyra marveled at her uncles skill. The old Sub-Rector was nearly blind, so it was courteous to make room for him he s, and his moving forward meant that the Master would be sittio the Librarian, only a matter of a yard or so from where Lyra was crouched in the wardrobe. As the Master settled in the armchair, Lyra heard him murmur:

    “The devil! He knew about the wine, Im sure of it.”

    The Librarian murmured back, “Hes going to ask for funds. If he forces a vote—”

    “If he does that, we must just argue against, with all the eloquence we have.”

    The lantern began to hiss as Lord Asriel pumped it hard. Lyra moved slightly so that she could see the s, where a brilliant white circle had begun to glow.

    Lord Asriel called, “Could someourn the lamp down?”

    One of the Schot up to do that, and the room darkened.

    Lord Asriel began:

    “As some of you know, I set out for the North twelve months ago on a diplomatic mission to the King of Lapland. At least, thats what I preteo be doing.

    In fact, my real aim was to go further north still, right on to the ice, in fact, to try and discover what had happeo the Grumman expedition. One of Grummans last messages to the academy in Berlin spoke of a certain natural phenomenon only seen in the lands of the North. I was determio iigate that as well as find out what I could about Grumman. But the first picture Im going to show you isnt directly about either of those things.”

    A the first slide into the frame and slid it behind the lens. A circular photogram in sharp blad white appeared on the s. It had been taken at night under a full moon, and it showed a wooden hut in the middle distas walls dark against the snow that surrou and lay thickly on the roof. Beside the hut stood an array of philosophical instruments, which looked to Lyras eye like something from the Anbaric Park on the road to Yarnton: aerials, wires, porcelain insulators, all glittering in the moonlight and thickly covered in frost. A man in furs, his face hardly visible in the deep hood of his garment, stood in the fround, with his hand raised as if iing. To one side of him stood a smaller figure. The moonlight bathed everything in the same pallid gleam.

    “That photogram was taken with a standard silver nitrate emulsion,” Lord Asriel said. “Id like you to look at another oaken from the same spot only a mier, with a new specially prepared emulsion.”

    He lifted out the first slide and dropped another into the frame. This was much darker; it was as if the moonlight had been filtered out. The horizon was still visible, with the dark shape of the hut and its light snow-covered roof standing out, but the plexity of the instruments was hidden in darkness. But the man had altogether ged: he was bathed in light, and a fountain of glowing particles seemed to be streaming from his upraised hand.

    “That light,” said the Chaplain, “is it going up or ing down?”

    “Its ing down,” said Lord Asriel, “but it isnt light. Its Dust.”

    Something in the way he said it made Lyra imagine dust with a capital letter, as if this wasnt ordinary dust. The rea of the Scholars firmed her feeling, because Lord Asriels words caused a sudden collective silence, followed by gasps of incredulity.

    “But how—”

    “Surely—”

    “It t—”

    “Gentlemen!” came the voice of the Chaplain. “Let Lord Asriel explain.”

    “Its Dust,” Lord Asriel repeated. “It registered as light on the plate because particles of Dust affect this emulsion as photons affect silver nitrate emulsion. It artly to test it that my expeditio north in the first place. As you see, the figure of the man is perfectly visible. Now Id like you to look at the shape to his left.”

    He indicated the blurred shape of the smaller figure.

    “I thought that was the mans daemon,” said the Enquirer.

    “No. His daemon was at the time coiled around his ne the form of a snake.

    That shape you  dimly see is a child.”

    “A severed child—?” said someone, and the way he stopped showed that he khis was something that shouldnt have been voiced.

    There was an intense silence.

    Then Lord Asriel said calmly, “Aire child. Which, giveure of Dust, is precisely the point, is it not?”

    No one spoke for several seds. Then came the voice of the Chaplain.

    “Ah,” he said, like a thirsty man who, having just drunk deeply, puts down the glass to let out the breath he has held while drinking. “And the streams of Dust...”

    “—e from the sky, and bathe him in what looks like light. You may examihis picture as closely as you wish: Ill leave it behind when I go. Im showing it to you now to demonstrate the effect of this new emulsion. Now Id like to show you another picture.”

    He ged the slide. The  picture was also taken at night, but this time without moonlight. It showed a small group of tents in the fround, dimly outlined against the low horizon, and beside them an untidy heap of wooden boxes and a sledge. But the main i of the picture lay in the sky. Streams and veils of light hung like curtains, looped aooned on invisible hooks hundreds of miles high or blowing out sideways in <big></big>the stream of some unimaginable wind.

    “What is that?” said the voice of the Sub-Rector.

    “Its a picture of the Aurora.”

    “Its a very fine photogram,” said the Palmerian Professor. “One of the best Ive seen.”

    “Five my ignorance,” said the shaky voice of the old Pretor, “but if I ever knew what the Aurora was, I have fotten. Is it what they call the Northern Lights?”

    “Yes. It has many names. Its posed of storms of charged particles and solar rays of intense araordinary strength—invisible in themselves, but causing this luminous radiatiohey i with the atmosphere. If thered been time, I would have had this slide tio show you the colors; pale green and rose, for the most part, with a tinge of crimson along the le of that curtain-like formation. This is taken with ordinary emulsion. Now Id like you to look at a picture taken with the special emulsion.”

    He took out the slide. Lyra heard the Master say quietly, “If he forces a vote, we could try to ihe residence clause. He hasnt been resident in the College for thirty weeks out of the last fifty-two.”

    “Hes already got the Chaplain on his side...” the Librarian murmured in reply.

    Lord Asriel put a new slide in the lantern frame. It showed the same se. As with the previous pair of pictures, many of the features visible by ordinary light were much dimmer in this one, and so were the curtains of radian the sky.

    But in the middle of the Aurora, high above the bleak landscape, Lyra could see something solid. She pressed her face to the crack to see more clearly, and she could see the Scholars he s leaning forward too. As she gazed, her wrew, because there in the sky was the unmistakable outline of a city:

    towers, domes, walls...Buildings and streets, suspended in the air! She nearly gasped with wohe Cassington Scholar said, “That looks like...a city.”

    “Exactly so,” said Lord Asriel.

    “A city in another world, no doubt?” said the Dean, with pt in his voice.

    Lord Asriel ignored him. There was a stir of excitement among some of the Scholars, as if, having writteises on the existence of the uni without ever having seeheyd beeed with a living example newly captured. “Is this the Barnard-Stokes business?” said the Palmerian Professor.

    “It is, isnt it?”

    “Thats what I want to find out,” said Lord Asriel. He stood to one side of the illuminated s. Lyra could see his dark eyes searg among the Scholars as they peered up at the slide of the Aurora, and the green glow of his demons eyes beside him. All the venerable heads were ing forward, their spectacles glinting; only the Master and the Librarian leaned ba their chairs, with their heads close together.

    The Chaplain was saying, “You said you were searg for news of the Grumman expedition, Lord Asriel.

    Was Dr. Grumman iigating this phenomenon too?”

    “I believe he was, and I believe he had a good deal of information about it. But he wont be able to tell us what it was, because hes dead.”

    “No!” said the Chaplain.

    “Im afraid so, and I have the proof here.”

    A ripple of excited apprehension ran round the Retiring Room as, under Lord Asriels dire, two or three of the younger Scholars carried the wooden box to the front of the room. Lord Asriel took out the last slide but left the lantern on, and in the dramatic glare of the circle of light he bent to lever open the box. Lyra heard the screech of nails ing out of damp wood. The Master stood up to look, blog Lyras view. Her uncle spoke again:

    “If you remember, Grummans expedition vanished eighteen months ago. <bdi>藏书网</bdi>The German Academy sent him up there to go as far north as the magic pole and make various celestial observations. It was in the course of that jourhat he observed the curious phenomenon weve already seen. Shortly after that, he vanished. Its been assumed that he had an act and that his bodys been lying in a crevasse all this time. In fact, there was no act.”

    “What have you got there?” said the Dean. “Is that a vacuum tainer?”

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