From Divination: A Conspiracy of Blood:
“Dee’s candle burned low as he worked, his quill scratching across parchment as he attempted to recreate some of the calculations that Kopernik had so casually performed. It was well past midnight when he finally set his work aside and retired to his bed.
As he drifted toward sleep, what he couldn’t know was that soon MikoĊaj Kopernik would be dead, and that he would find himself at the centre of a mystery that threatened not only his academic future but the stability of the realm itself.
John Dee woke before dawn, his mind already turning over the revelations from the previous evening’s lecture.
By the light of a candle, he mixed a fresh batch of ink, then settled down at his desk to build on his efforts of last night and to reproduce what he could of Kopernik’s forecasts.
Three wasted sheets of paper later, he abandoned the effort. The balled-up papers that lay at his feet together with two broken quills were testament to the difficulty of recreating another man’s life’s work.
Surprisingly, perhaps, he was still upbeat.
I may not have duplicated Master Kopernik’s forecasting technique, but at least I am well prepared for my breakfast meeting with him, he told himself.
He donned his second-best scholar’s gown, then placed a sheet of carefully prepared questions into his leather satchel, together with several blank sheets of paper and his writing implements.
The morning air was sharp with the chill of spring as he made his way through the narrow streets towards the Cross Keys Inn. Cambridge was stirring; apprentices opening shop shutters, maids fetching buckets of water, bleary-eyed students making their way back from taverns or going to prayers – in some cases both. Dee barely noticed any of it, his thoughts firmly on his up-coming meeting.”