Calista

by Laura Rahme

  “An accomplice, without a doubt. The entire operation was a farce.”

  “Like you, there were numerous attempts to discredit Mr. Cloquet. But he asserted that everything was true despite being ridiculed in the London Medical Gazette and the Nottingham Journal.”

  “An assertion of conspiracy! So what do you suggest, Aaron? Do you sincerely believe that by waving your hands, you can change a staff to a writhing snake?”

  Aaron’s old-fashioned biblical name was often the subject of derision. “Spare me the mockery. The scientific basis is perfectly clear. Similar procedures have been replicated in America.”

  “Scientific basis? I am astounded, Aaron.” Raymond shook his head while attempting to finish the meat on his plate.

  “What you persist in ignoring is that I am far from alone. Hear this. For almost three years now, the Baron du Potet, a French mesmerist, has conducted promising work at the North London hospital. While physicians have directed their studies on applying animal magnetism to the practice of pain free surgery, du Potet has evolved it to the art of magnetic healing.”

  “Magnetic healing? For goodness’ sake. I don’t wish to offend you, Aaron, but all this seems a little fanciful to me. I consider myself a man of science. If I cannot see it, it does not exist.”

  “Have it your way, Raymond. Call me a madman, but know this: du Potet has successfully healed an epileptic girl. You ought to read the letter in the Lancet from a couple of years ago. Better still, I’ll lend you a copy of his Introduction to the Study of Animal Magnetism, it might even open your eyes.”

  Raymond had ceased eating.

  “My dear colleague,” he said, “might you not agree there is a significant leap between allaying pain and healing a patient? You seem to place enormous faith in this du Potet. My friend, return to London. Leave this place. Isolation corrupts the mind. Listen to yourself. Do you realise what you are saying?”

  Aaron straightened. His recent excitement had given way to a grave expression.

  “I have travelled the world, Raymond. The incredible things I have witnessed in India are contrary to what the medical sciences would have us believe. Du Potet only scratches the surface of true potential. I, for one, hold the unshakeable belief that certain individuals, more than the rest, have in them something of this magnetic quality. Without a doubt. I believe this force can heal. It can redress imbalances in others and, yes, it can lead other beings into different states of awareness.”

  “Like Jesus? Forgive me, Aaron. And I say this as your friend, but I fear many of us remain dubious about these Mesmerism fancies. If you want the rumours to cease, you are going to have to prove all of this.”

  A cold smile drew itself on Aaron’s face.

  “That is exactly my intention,” he replied.

  “Oh, really? What are you planning to do? Hire a mesmerist and conduct vivisections on willing patients? You’ll hardly find any volunteers. All the best of luck with that.”

  At Raymond’s signal, Shannon brought over the wine and refilled his glass. Calista sat on the edge of her seat, her eyes riveted on the trickling red liquid. With each drop, she felt a growing sense of dread.

  Aaron reached for her hand and brought it to his lips. His palm was moist.

  “I’m sorry we have bored you, my darling. Mr. Rogers, here, does not believe in an extraordinary phenomenon that has fascinated me all of my life. It unsettles him, you see. Often, so-called wise men remain anchored to their prejudices, and in this, they may as well be fools.”

  Calista smiled despite a wary premonition that chilled her spine. She had felt the heat of her husband’s kiss on her skin. She had known instantly that Aaron’s cool charm belied the seething rage she sensed now, coursing through him like an electric fire. She turned nervously to their guest. “And how was your dinner, Mr. Rogers? I hope you enjoyed it.”

  “Oh, wonderful, madam. I’ve not had the pleasure of venison in months. My compliments to your cook. And you, my lady, you’ve been such a charming hostess. It’s a wonder you’ve not thrown me out for lecturing your husband. I must say, I deeply admire your patience. That is the way of the world in the medical field, I’m afraid. We find ourselves constantly at each other’s throats and we seem to exist only to disagree.” Then before Calista could respond, he turned abruptly to Aaron, “But I insist that being away from London has muddled your head. I’ve wondered how you can possibly fare so far from everything. This house is still a long way from Reading. Does Mrs. Nightingale not feel lonely?”

  Calista was heartened by Raymond’s words. She’d never had the courage to voice how she felt to Aaron. Perhaps Aaron would also be swayed. Mrs. Cleary had fondly spoken of London and Calista already imagined Regent Park, the river Thames, the elegant boutiques and coffee shops. There was a world to see out there. It wasn’t sunny Kerkyra, but it was something. She turned to her husband, awaiting his response. But Aaron’s faraway expression had blackened.

  “There are means to bring the best of all we need to Alexandra Hall. Everything, anything at all can be purchased and transported here,” replied Aaron darkly. He seemed miles away, barely looking into Raymond’s eyes as he spoke.

  The latter tilted his head, suddenly aware of Aaron’s changed mood. He set his wine glass on the table.

  “I meant it, you know,” insisted Raymond. “If you can find a method to prove your far-fetched theories, then all the best to you. But tell me, do you have a mesmerist in mind? Another Frenchman, perhaps?”

  Aaron did not reply to this ultimate provocation. He glanced at Calista, who stiffened, before meeting her husband’s gaze with her own penetrating blue and black eyes.

  “I have better than a mesmerist,” said Aaron.

  And he grasped her hand tighter than he ever had.

  Lost Souls of Alexandra Hall

  IT had begun with dogs then later, cats. Aaron would encourage her to caress the animal and bond with it. For the first few days, it grew accustomed to the cellar. This would take a week and then the subject, as Aaron liked to call them, would attach itself to her and begin to obey all her orders.

  It was her favourite period. She loved them and they loved her. But what she loved most, was the enchantment it seemed to have on Aaron. When he saw her interact with the animals, he fell once more under her spell, and she glimpsed the wonderment in his eyes. It reminded her of how he used to stare at her in Kerkyra. It reassured her that all was well between them. As the days passed, Aaron was continually impressed by her abilities, her animal magnetism, as he called it. It made her feel useful. It made her feel loved for who she was.

  In the early days, he also taught her how to use a stethoscope. With the dog or fox, lying down strapped on a table, she would press the end of this wooden tubular contraption and listen for the animal’s heartbeats.

  She learnt to recognise when the animal was unsettled or when it was calm, just by listening to the ebb and flow of its breathing and the pulsing beats deep within its chest.

  “If the subject is in distress,” advised Aaron, “then you must take over.”

  Aaron had designed what he called his pain free experiments. It began as a period of soothing where Calista caressed the animal and monitored its heartbeat. She would record the number of beats per minute. Aaron prepared the instruments and washed his hands in a basin.

  The first time the candlelight reflected on the metal implements, Calista had almost swooned. As Aaron laid out various surgical contraptions from his opened leather case, she felt herself grow weak.

  She had lost all courage. “What are you going to do?” she had asked in disbelief.

  “You can do this, Calista. Do not fail me,” had replied Aaron. He shot her such a stern expression that she felt a nasty jolt in her chest. From that moment, she asked few questions.

  And in his journal, Aaron would describe the nature of each experiment. He undertook the minor operations first, those he deemed would inflict less pain and were unlikely to harm the animals. The
n, over the months, if the animal remained alive, he performed more advanced vivisections – removal of a paw, an ear, the kidney, or else an entire limb.

  The method was simple. Soothe, operate, monitor and soothe again.

  “I can’t do this,” she cried out, the first time he brandished the knife over a yelping Labrador puppy.

  “Calista, you must trust in your capacity to diminish its pain. Everything rests upon you and your magnetic force.”

  Calista shook her head violently.

  “No, no, Aaron. I cannot do this. I can barely look. Don’t make me look.”

  “Shut it out. Look away if you must. Focus on its heartbeat. Raise your arm, like this, if you find it is in distress and you wish me to pause. Then it is up to you to soothe it. If you do not apply yourself properly to calm it, it will feel pain, Calista.”

  Calista flinched away, trembling. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Calista, my darling. We’ve spoken about this. I do not possess your abilities. But this dog,” he said, pointing to the puppy strapped upon its side, “has utmost faith in you. Use it. You must caress it and speak to it like you always have, continue to hold its attention until it focuses only on your voice, until it falls into a trance and begins to lose sensation and feels no pain. Do you understand?”

  Calista had not been convinced. But she’d tried. To her great relief, the minor operation was completed smoothly, with the puppy’s expressive eyes fixed upon her face. It yelped a little when the knife was inserted but she worked her magic, covering its groans with her soothing voice until it quietened. Calista was astounded. It had barely registered the pain. Its breathing remained steady and the heartbeat had not changed. She had dressed the wound and watched the puppy settle upon its paws, a little shaken but without noticeable distress.

  This very first experiment revived her faith in her husband. Perhaps Aaron was right and the subjects would never feel pain. What point was there in being afraid? After all, it was up to her, wasn’t it?

  Aaron worked only on minor vivisections in the first years. On each occasion, the subject was bundled up in a blanket then released and returned to the countryside or in a farm. Calista had not known what to expect but over time she felt saddened, realising that she would not see them again. Each subject began to represent an impending loss. It was her silent wound. For to bond with it so deeply and to impress on it her magnetic force, she made herself vulnerable to letting it go.

  Over the years, for each operation, Aaron made corresponding notes in his journals describing his methods and whether or not the results were significant in demonstrating the effect of animal magnetism. The first indication of success was an observed stability in the subject’s pulse over the entire operation, with no significant variation. The second measure of success was whether the animal stabilised after the operation – whether it ate normally, ignoring its sutures, or showed signs of stress and pain.

  Aaron had been pleased with the results of the minor operations. He had written that so far, animal magnetism had proved effective in producing pain free operations.

  He had devised a naming convention for the subjects. D1 was for the first dog subject. D2, applied to the second dog, and so on and so forth... He employed F, for fox and then later, C, for cat. Calista conceded it was easier to refer to the subject by an initial, rather than a name. Though it lacked warmth.

  Things worsened in the following years.

  The first kidney vivisection did not go as planned. Calista stared in dismay as blood spilled from the wound, staining her red dress. The cat shrieked and she lost its attention. Pressing her own ear on that damned wooden tube, she had noted the cat’s galloping heartbeat. Her nerves were shot. She shook throughout the entire operation. As for the cat, it shrieked until it lost consciousness.

  But over time, the couple made progress. Certainly, animals succumbed to their wounds following the procedures, and most of them eventually died, but it appeared to Aaron they felt no pain.

  “We need to work harder, Calista,” he would say. “Stronger results, would require the creature to stay alive. The subject needs to be oblivious to what it has undergone. For days afterwards, it must go on living, feeling no pain.”

  But despite all her efforts, the animals kept dying soon after. Dispirited, Calista would lay them inside an old wooden trunk and Aaron would bolt it shut then ask Alfred, who ignored everything, to burn the trunk.

  On the day following an operation that went awfully astray, Calista was staring expressionless at the remains of a fox on the operating table. She was hunched forward and stunned by what she had witnessed. Aaron wiped the blood off his hands and threw away the cloth in anger.

  “Something is not working as it should,” he grunted. “The creature knows too much. It knows in itself that something is wrong and it behaves accordingly.”

  Calista ran a trembling hand over her forehead. She wrapped the dismembered fox in a hemp cloth and laid it into a trunk which the gardener would later burn.

  Aaron sat by his desk, brooding over the flaws in his experiment. “They are too intelligent. They know what they have endured, even if they are soothed. We will need to make use of a stupid creature. Or else, I will have to stun the subject…”

  Aaron soon settled on the idea of drugging his subjects, employing various pills and medicinal concoctions he had studied during a past trip to Nanking and Peking. He experimented with various combinations and in the first instance, where he had once been curious to see if the animal would live, he now grew fascinated by another idea.

  “What if it were made to be more aggressive?”

  Calista’s vision blurred. They had strained themselves all week and she had so far witnessed the death of two dogs.

  “You wish them to be more aggressive?” she asked in disbelief.

  “Think of it, Calista. If in the first instance, the subject were to be rendered anxious or aggressive, if it were agitated, then we could measure the degree to which the animal magnetism succeeds in returning it to a calmer state. Think of it. In what extreme state must a subject find itself before you fail to soothe it?”

  “But it will attack us…”

  “Calista, will you cease fretting? We will strap it down, like we always do.”

  Aaron set about to order and catalogue various medicinal capsules and tablets.

  I am astounded to discover that, for minor operations at least, a rise in aggressive behaviour does not lead to any significant tempering of the effect of animal magnetism. The subject heals steadily and does not feel pain.

  When Calista had read Aaron’s stunning conclusion, she felt herself grow numb. Could he not see that with subjects in an aggressive state, she was more and more afraid to enter the cellar? Could he not see she was exhausted with each attempt to becalm the animals? They would often scratch and bite and to maintain them in a calm state, robbed her of her own inner peace. Over time, these violent exchanges had seeded in her a feeling she had never experienced before – a simmering rage that she fought to suppress.

  These days, Aaron’s interest in her powers no longer made Calista proud. She had noted the rise in his arrogance. He snapped at her more often. He would grow impatient if she needed to rest or if she averted her eyes from the operating table. But more upsetting, was the cruel light glowing in Aaron’s eyes when he handled the subjects. Where in past years, she and Aaron would simply burn the dead, now Aaron wished to keep a severed part of the animal in a sealed jar, like a relic. Calista never questioned her husband but she felt the disquiet grow within her. There were now dozens of these trophies upon the shelves. Every day, the underground chamber acquired a nightmarish quality.

  When Aaron began to experiment with stronger drugs, Calista somehow found the strength within her to continue.

  On a tin tray, she would crush the contents of several drug pellets and blend this powder into the animals’ food. One day, she called Aaron.

  “It’s gone. I’ve only just rele
ased the fox, and already, the food has disappeared before it could get to it.”

  They looked everywhere and in the end, Calista was forced to setup another bowl of crushed biscuits where she had stirred in the powdered tablet.

  In the evening of the same day, Aaron heard Willy had bitten Shannon. It had demonstrated aggressive behaviour all afternoon.

  Soon afterwards, Aaron examined Shannon’s hand and dressed it. Calista had locked herself in her room and told everyone she was not having supper.

  “I understand Mrs. Nightingale’s distress. I’ve had Willy tied up in the gardener’s shed. We shall have to put it down,” said Mrs. Cleary after dinner.

  “You will do no such thing,” said Aaron.

  “I beg your pardon Mr. Nightingale, we cannot have Mary’s dog running around like it did, and biting every living soul. Mary was quite upset about it. And Shannon is lucky she still has her hand. That dog might have had rabies, have you thought of it?”