machinator

plural machinators

1. One who machinates, or forms a scheme with evil designs; a plotter or artful schemer.

   Before long the two machinators abandoned the rigour of the bare studio for a snug corner of a café.

   1904, O. Henry, “Masters of Arts”, in Cabbages and Kings, page 264

   4 more examples

   what Archimedes did by the cleane strength of his ingenious Art, no lesse admirable, then commendable for the defence of his Citty, and Countrey against the Romanes: that doe this viperous brood by their Arte infernall, no lesse detestable then damnable (infused into them by that Romaine Architect or cheife machinator of all mischiefe) to betray their owne deare Mother Countrey into the hands of Rome,

   1627, Henry Burton, The Baiting of the Popes Bull, page 26

   […] ’tis one of the great Designs, as ’tis certainly the Interest, of those wicked Agents and Machinators, industriously to hide from us their Influences and Ways of acting;

   1726, Joseph Glanvill, Sadducismus Triumphatus: Or, A full and plain Evidence, concerning Witches and Apparitions, page 18

   Since then, he hath become an active and earnest agitator, a murmurer, and a machinator, and a leader amongst those who impugn our authority;

   1820, Walter Scott, chapter 5, in Ivanhoe, volume 3, pages 127-128

   [Augustine] and Cicero would be found to be brothers in many ways: failed family men and political upstart machinators whose prestige and creations succeeded beyond their lifetimes even while they themselves died amid the ruins of their earthly hopes;

   2005, James J. O’Donnell, chapter 7, in Augustine: A New Biography, page 189