SEVEN - JOHN FAA-2

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    “The Aurora,” said Farder . “Is that right, Lyra?”

    “Yeah, thats it. And in the lights of the Roarer there was like a city. All towers and churches and domes and that. It was a bit like Oxford, thats what I thought, anyway. And Uncle Asriel, he was more ied in that, I think, but the Master and the other Scholars were more ied in Dust, like Mrs.

    Coulter and Lord Boreal and them.”

    “I see,” said Farder . “Thats very iing.”

    “Now, Lyra,” said John Faa, “Im a going to tell you something. Farder  here, hes a wise man. Hes a seer. Hes been a f all whats been going on with Dust and the Gobblers and Lord Asriel and everything else, and hes been a f you. Every time the Costas went to Oxford, or half a dozen other families, e to that, they brought back a bit of news. About you, child. Did you know that?”

    Lyra shook her head. She was beginning to be frightened. Pantalaimon was growling too deep for ao hear, but she could feel it in her fiips down inside his fur.

    “Oh, yes,” said John Faa, “all your doings, they all get back to Farder  here.”

    Lyra couldnt hold it in.

    “We didnt damage it! Ho! It was only a bit of mud! And we never got very far—”

    “What are you talking about, child?” said John Faa.

    Farder  laughed. When he did that, his shaking stopped and his face became bright and young.

    But Lyra wasnt laughing. With trembling lips she said, “And even if we had found the bung, wed neverve took it out! It was just a joke. We wouldntve sunk it, never!”

    Then John Faa began to laugh too. He slapped a broad hand oable so hard the glasses rang, and his massive shoulders shook, and he had to wipe away the tears from his eyes. Lyra had never seen such a sight, never heard such a bellow; it was like a mountain laughing.

    “Oh, yes,” he said when he could speak again, “we heard about that too, little girl! I dont suppose the Costas have set foot anywhere sihen without being reminded of it. You better leave a guard on your boat, Tony, people say. Fierce little girls round here! Oh, that story went all over the fens, child. But we ent going to punish you for it. No, no! Ease your mind.”

    He looked at Farder , and the two old men laughed again, . mently.

    And Lyra felt tented, and safe.

    Finally John Faa shook his head and became serious again.

    “I were saying, Lyra, as we knew about you from a child. From a baby. You oughter know what we know. I t guess what they told you at Jordan College about where you came from, but they dont know the whole truth of it. Did they ever tell you who your parents were?”

    Now Lyra was pletely dazed.

    “Yes,” she said. “They said I was—they said they—they said Lord Asriel put me there because my mother and father died in an airship act. Thats what they told me.”

    “Ah, did they. Well now, child, Im a going to tell you a story, a true story. I know its true, because a gyptian woman told me, and they all tell the truth to John Faa and Farder . So this is the truth about yourself, Lyra. Your father never perished in no airship act, because your father is Lord Asriel.”

    Lyra could only sit in wonder.

    “Heres how it came about,” John Faa went on. “When he was a young man, Lord Asriel went expl all over the North, and came back with a great fortune.

    And he was a high-spirited man, quick to anger, a passionate man.

    “And your mother, she assiooo. Not so well born as him, but a clever woman. A Scholar, even, and those who saw her said she was very beautiful. She and your father, they fell in love as soons they met.

    “The trouble was, your mother was already married. Shed married a politi.

    He was a member of the kings party, one of his p>?.</samp>sest advisers. A rising man.

    “Now when your mother found herself with child, she feared to tell her husband the child wasnt his.<var>藏书网</var> And when the baby was born—thats you, girl—it was clear from the look of you that you didnt favor her husband, but your true father, and she thought it best to hide you away and give out that youd died.

    “So you was took to Oxfordshire, where your father had estates, and put in the care of a gyptian woman to nurse. But someone whispered to your mothers husband what had happened, and he came a flying down and ransacked the cottage where the gyptian woman had been, only shed fled to the great house; and the husband followed after, in a murderous passion.

    “Lord Asriel was out a hunting, but they got word to him and he came riding ba time to find your mothers husband at the foot of the great staircase.

    Another moment and hed have forced open the closet where the gyptian woman was hiding with you, but Lord Asriel challenged him, and they fought there and then, and Lord Asriel killed him.

    “The gyptian woman heard and saw it all, Lyra, and thats how we know.

    “The sequence was a great lawsuit. Your father ent the kind of man to deny or ceal the truth, and it left the judges with a problem. Hed killed all right, hed shed blood, but he was defending his home and his child against an intruder. On tother hand, the law allows any man to avehe violation of his wife, and the dead mans lawyers argued that he were doing just that.

    “The c<bdo></bdo>ase lasted for weeks, with volumes ument bad forth. In the end the judges punished Lord Asriel by fisg all his property and all his land, a him a poor man; and he had been richer than a king.

    “As for your mother, she wanted nothing to do with it, nor with you. She turned her back. The gyptian old me shed often been afeared of how your mother would treat you, because she roud and sful woman. So much for her.

    “Then there was you. If things had fallen out different, Lyra, you might have been brought up a gyptian, because the nurse begged the court to let her have you; but we gyptians got little standing in the law. The court decided you was to be placed in a priory, and so you were, with the Sisters of Obedie Watlington. You wont remember.

    “But Lord Asriel wouldnt stand for that. He had a hatred of priors and monks and nuns, and being a high-handed man he just rode in one day and carried you off. Not to look after himself, nor to give to the gyptians; he took you to Jordan College, and dared the law to undo it.

    “Well, the law let things be. Lord Asriel went back to his explorations, and you grew up at Jordan College. The ohing he said, your father, the one dition he made, was that your mother should see you. If she ever tried to do that, she was to be prevented, and he was to be told, because all the anger in his nature had turned against her now. The Master promised faithfully to do that; and so time passed.

    “Then e all this ay about Dust. And all over the try, all over the world, wise men and women too began a w about it. It werent of any at to us gyptians, until they started taking our kids. Thats whe ied. A es in all sorts of places you wouldnt imagine, including Jordan College. You wouldnt know, but theres been someone a watg over you aing to us ever since you been there. Cause we got an i in you, and that gyptian woman who nursed you, she opped being anxious on your behalf.”

    “Who was it watg over me?” said Lyra. She felt immensely important and strahat all her doings should be an object of  so far away.

    “It was a kit servant. It was Bernie Johahe pastry cook. Hes half-gyptian; you never khat, Ill be bound.”

    Bernie was a kindly, solitary man, one of those rare people whose daemon was the same sex as himself. It was Bernie shed shouted at in her despair when Roger was taken. And Bernie had been telling the gyptians everything! She marveled.

    “So anyway,” John Faa went on, “we heard about you going away from Jordan College, and how it came about at a time when Lord Asriel was imprisoned and couldnt prevent it. And we remembered what hed said to the Master that he must never do, and we remembered that the man your mother had married, the politi Lord Asriel killed, was called Edward Coulter.”

    “Mrs. Coulter?” said Lyra, quite stupefied. “She ent my mother?”

    “She is. And if your father had been free, she wouldnt never have dared to defy him, and youd still be at Jordan, not knowing a thing. But what the Master was a doiing you go is a mystery I t explain. He was charged with your care. All I  guess is that she had some power over him.”

    Lyra suddenly uood the Masters curious behavior on the m shed left.

    “But he didnt want to...” she said, trying to remember it exactly. “He...I had to go and see him first thing that m, and I mustnt tell Mrs.

    Coulter....It was like he wao protect me from her...” She stopped, and looked at the two men carefully, and then decided to tell them the whole truth about the Retiring Room. “See, there was something else.

    That evening I hid iiring Room, I saw the Master try to poison Lord Asriel. I saw him put some powder in the wine and I told my uncle and he khe deter off the table and spilled it. So I saved his life. I could never uand why the Master would want to poison him, because he was always so kind. Then on the m I left he called me in early to his study, and I had to go secretly so no one would know, and he said...” Lyra racked her brains to try and remember exactly what it was the Master had said. No good; she shook her head. “The only thing I could uand was that he gave me something and I had to keep it secret from her, from Mrs. Coulter. I suppose its all right if I tell you....”

    She felt in the pocket of the wolfskin coat and took out the velvet package. She laid it oable, and she sensed John Faas massive simple curiosity and Farder s bright flickering intelligeh trained on it like searchlights.

    When she laid the alethiometer bare, it was Farder  who spoke first.

    “I hought Id ever set eyes on one of them again. Thats a symbol reader.

    Did he tell you anything about it, child?”

    “No. Only that Id have to work out how to read it by myself. And he called it ahiometer.”

    “Whats that mean?” said John Faa, turning to his panion.

    “Thats a Greek word. I re its from aktheia, which means truth. Its a truth measure. And have you worked out how to use it?” he said to her.

    “No. Least, I  make the three short hands point to different pictures, but I t do anything with the long o goes all over. Except sometimes, right, sometimes when Im sort of trating, I  make the long needle go this way or that just by thinking it.”

    “Whats it do, Farder ?” said John Faa. “And how do you read it?”

    “All these pictures round the rim,” said Farder , holding it delicately toward John Faas blunt strong gaze, “theyre symbols, and eae stands for a whole series of things. Take the anchor, there. The first meaning of that is hope, because hope holds you fast like an anchor so you dont give way. The seeaning is steadfastness. The third meaning is snag, or prevention. The fourth meaning is the sea. And so on, down to ten, twelve, maybe a never-ending series of meanings.”

    “And do you know them all?”

    “I know some, but to read it fully Id he book. I seen the book and I know where it is, but I ent got it.”

    “Well e back to that,” said John Faa. “Go on with how you read it.”

    “You got three hands you  trol,” Farder  explained, “and you use them to ask a question. By pointing to three symbols you  ask any question you  imagine, because youve got so many levels of eae. Once you got your question framed, the other needle swings round and points to more symbols that give you the answer.”

    “But how does it know what level youre a thinking of when you set the question?” said John Faa.

    “Ah, by itself it dont. It only works if the questioner holds the levels in their mind. You got to know all the meanings, first, and there must be a thousand or more. Then you got to be able to hold em in your mind without fretting at it or pushing for an answer, and just watch while the needle wanders. When its gone round its full range, youll know what the answer is. I know how it works because I seen it done once by a wise man in Uppsala, and thats the only time I ever saw one before. Do you know how rare these are?”

    “The Master told me there was only six made,” Lyra said.

    “Whatever the number, it ent large.”

    “And you kept this secret from Mrs. Coulter, like the Master told you?” said John Faa.

    “Yes. But her daemht, he used to go in my room. And Im sure he found it.”

    “I see. Well, Lyra, I dont know if well ever uand the full truth, but this is my guess, as good as I  make it. The Master was given a charge by Lord Asriel to look after you and keep you safe from your mother. And that was what he did, for ten years or more. Then Mrs. Coulters friends in the Church helped her set up this Oblation Board, for urpose we dont know, and there she was, as powerful in her way as Lord Asriel was in his. Your parents, both strong in the world, both ambitious, and the Master of Jordan holding you in the balaween them.

    “Now the Masters got a huhings to look after. His first  is his College and the scholarship there. So if he sees a threat to that, he has to move agin it. And the Chur ret times, Lyra, its been a getting more anding. Theres cils for this and cils for that; theres talk of reviving the Office of Inquisition, God forbid. And the Master has to tread warily between all these powers. He has to keep Jordan College on the right side of the Church, or it wont survive.

    “And another  of the Master is you, child. Bernie Johansen was always clear about that. The Master of Jordan and the other Scholars, they loved you like their own child. Theyd do anything to keep you safe, not just because theyd promised to Lord Asriel that they would, but for your own sake. So if the Master gave you up to Mrs. Coulter when hed promised Lord Asriel he wouldnt, he must have thought youd be safer with her than in Jordan College, in spite of all appearances. And whe out to poison Lord Asriel, he must have thought that what Lord Asriel was a doing would place all of them in danger, and maybe all of us, too; maybe all the world. I see the Master as a man having terrible choices to make; whatever he chooses will do harm, but maybe if he does the right thing, a little less harm will e about than if he chooses wrong. God preserve me from having to make that sort of choice.

    “And when it e to the point where he had to let you go, he gave you the symbol reader and bade you keep it safe. I wonder what he had in mind for you to do with it; as you couldnt read it, Im foxed as to what he was a thinking.”

    “He said Uncle Asriel presehe alethiometer to Jordan College years before,” Lyra said, struggling to remember. “He was going to say something else, and then someone k the door and he had to stop. What I thought was, he might have wanted me to keep it away from Lord Asriel too.”

    “Or even the opposite,” said John Faa.

    “What dyou mean, John?” said Farder .

    “He might have had it in mind to ask Lyra to return it to Lord Asriel, as a kind of repense f to poison him. He might have thought the danger from Lord Asriel had passed. Or that Lord Asriel could read some wisdom from this instrument and hold back from his purpose. If Lord Asriels held captive now, it might help set him free. Well, Lyra, you better take this symbol reader and keep it safe. If you kept it safe so far, I ent worried about leaving it with you.

    But there might e a time when we o sult it, and I re well ask for it then.”

    He folded the velvet over it and slid it back across the table. Lyra wao ask all kinds of questions, but suddenly she felt shy of this massive man, with his little eyes so sharp and kindly among their folds and wrinkles.

    Ohing she had to ask, though.

    “Who was the gyptian woman who nursed me ?”

    “Why, it was Billy Costas mother, of course. She wont have told you, because I e her, but she knows what were a talking of here, so its all out in the open.

    “Now you best be getting back to her. You got plenty to be a thinking of, child.

    When three days is gone past, well have another roping and discuss all there is to do. You be a good girl. Goodnight, Lyra.”

    “Goodnight, Lord Faa. Goodnight, Farder ,” she said politely, clutg the alethiometer to her breast with one hand and scooping up Pantalaimon with the other.

    Both old men smiled kindly at her. Outside the door of the parley room Ma Costa was waiting, and as if nothing had happened since Lyra was born, the boat mathered her intreat arms and kissed her before bearing her off to bed.

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