by Hester Fox
“Miss Bellefonte, I am warning you. If you—”
But Alice continued, speaking over him. “You didn’t mean to kill her, did you? It just happened, and before you knew it, it was too late. I know that you loved her. It must have hurt to see her with the very man who had taken your business from you, as well. You stayed silent, but all the while the woman you loved cared for you no more than the most casual of acquaintances. You could never hope she would return your love, of course. How could any woman, let alone a gentle, sweet woman like Rose Hammond, love a monster such as yourself?”
In an instant he was rushing toward Alice, just as he had done to Tabby in his study. He was going to hurt her, kill her, right there in front of all those respectable men. Tabby willed her sluggish body to come to life, but she had no more feeling in her legs than she did in her heavy tongue. She was going to watch Mr. Whitby kill her sister and she was helpless to stop him.
Dr. Jameson was just stepping in front of Mr. Whitby, hands out, when there was a heavy thud from the gallery. “Open the door!” came a muffled cry. “In the name of the police, open the door!”
Mr. Whitby stopped in his tracks, his fist still raised as if he had only just stopped himself from swinging it.
“That will be Sergeant Hodsdon,” Dr. Jameson said. “Come, Richard. Be reasonable and leave the girl alone.”
She watched as a spectrum of emotions wrestled across Mr. Whitby’s face. At his outburst, all sounds had stopped in the theater. Kidnapping, coercion, and drugging were all acceptable in the name of science, but it seemed that the murder of a young woman was a bridge too far, even for the learned men gathered there.
Mr. Whitby’s expression turned introspective, as if he’d forgotten where he was. His hand trembled as he absently adjusted his crisp neckcloth. “I didn’t go there with the intent to kill her, only to talk. I had to make her understand how I felt about her, and why it was so hurtful, so disrespectful that she would continue her engagement to Caleb, the man who had inherited the business that should have been mine. But she wouldn’t listen, and things grew heated between us. I put my hands around her neck, just enough to make her listen, but she wouldn’t stop struggling. I never meant to kill her,” he repeated dully. “It was pure luck that she and Caleb were heard arguing earlier in the evening. That helped me immensely.”
Tabby somehow found the strength to hoarsely ask: “But what about the stabbing? Why stab her once you had already strangled her?”
Mr. Whitby frowned at her, then gave a little shrug. “I of all people know what can become of a pristine corpse. It was my last act of love, to save her from such men as myself.”
The old man with the cane stood up again. “When I invested in this venture, it was with the understanding that all the bodies used would be those of criminals or the insane. I will not be party to such depravity. I want my money back.” More men stood up, shouting their displeasure and waving hats in the air.
It was then that the gallery door finally gave, and Sergeant Hodsdon came storming in, a half-dozen uniformed officers behind him. Like rats scattering from a sinking ship, the men in the audience fled, no doubt afraid that their own participation would be grounds for arrest.
“I think we’ve seen enough,” Sergeant Hodsdon said, a pair of irons open and ready in his hand. “Richard Whitby, you are hereby placed under arrest for the murder of Rose Hammond.”
Mr. Whitby came back to himself. “You can’t arrest me!” he roared. “We paid you! You are just as complicit as any man here!”
Sergeant Hodsdon was silent as he placed the irons around Mr. Whitby’s wrists. More officers were pouring in now, and Dr. Jameson sadly held his hands in front him, waiting for his own set of irons to be placed around them.
Tabby finally met Alice’s eye from across the floor. A current as strong as electricity passed between them. But what little strength she had found to confront Mr. Whitby had long since dissolved, and when next she closed her eyes, she did not open them again for a long time.
34
“WHEN WE TWO PARTED.”
“SHH, SHE’S WAKING UP!”
She had been floating, her body light and inconsequential. This was not the pressing darkness of the in-between place, and she couldn’t be dead because her head was pounding like the devil, her bladder was full, and there was a sour gnawing in her stomach. But she let herself drift a little longer, clinging to this comfortable nothingness like a dream, afraid to wake up and find herself in that horrid place again.
This time when the world slowly came into focus, it was not the kerosene lamps nor the sterile wood gallery of the operating theater, but the familiar eaves of her small room in the boarding house attic. The dim light coming through the little window was too much, though, and she closed her eyes again. Around her, she could feel the heat and presence of people gathered in the tiny space.
“Tabby, can you hear me?”
The Irish voice was low and sweet, like liquid velvet, and Tabby had never heard anything more welcome in her life. “Mary-Ruth,” she croaked.
“That’s right, dearest. And Alice is here, too.”
“Hello, Tabby.”
It took Tabby a minute to place what she was seeing, who she was seeing. Had she slipped back into the ether? Had she finally made contact with the one person who had eluded her after all these years? But no, there was no darkness, no terrible wind, no creeping sense of dread. She was tucked safe in her room and the woman who stood before her was as real as the cold rain that fell in needles against the window.
Tabby gave a little cry and, mindless of her sluggish legs and aching head, was out of bed and across the room in a flash. All resentment, all loneliness was forgotten as she felt her sister’s arms close around her.
“I’ll wait outside,” Mary-Ruth said, closing the door behind her.
“Oh God, Alice,” she said between sobs into her shoulder. She was twelve years old, scared that if she let go she would never see her sister again.
Alice was stroking her hair, then holding her at arm’s length and surveying her with her clear, sharp eyes. “I’m so sorry, Tabby. I never meant to leave you. I only wanted to make sure that you were safe. If...if you can’t forgive me, I would understand.”
All these years she had lived with a hole in her heart, a wound that would not heal. Her sister had not been quite a ghost, but not quite living either, so Tabby had neither body to mourn, nor hope to cling to. As she looked at Alice now, she felt the raw edges of her heart begin to fuse and heal. So this was what those mad resurrection men sought to do. This was the second chance that they strove to bring about. But their reasons were tainted by money and power; Mr. Whitby, Dr. Jameson, and the rest would never understand the tender beating of a heart and what it meant. They would never understand that only love could cross such a divide.
“There’s nothing to be sorry for.” She allowed herself to hold Alice for as long as she could, before her legs began to tremble and she had to get back into bed. When she was warmly tucked back in, she gazed at her sister, committing to memory the clearness of her sharp, intelligent eyes, the way her lips curved up ever so slightly in the smile that she’d given to Tabby when trying to reassure her as children.
“Where have you been? And why are you back now?”
“I think that may be a conversation for another time,” Alice said. “A time when the dust has settled from the last few days.”
Though Tabby was burning with curiosity, she knew her sister was right; there would be time now, all the time in the world. “What happened in the last few days, exactly?” Memories of a faceless audience of men, of a chalk-white corpse beneath a sheet flitted through her pounding head.
There was a brittle silence before Alice spoke. “You were part of some experiment, taken by Mr. Whitby to help him communicate with the spirit world in his quest for resurrecting the dead.”
Tabby didn’t need to be reminded of all that. She would have the tang of chemicals, Dr. Jameson’s greedy eyes, and Mr. Whitby’s cold, dispassionate voice bored into her memory until the day she died, and perhaps beyond.
“He was arrested, and when the public gets wind of everything that has been happening at Harvard, Mr. Whitby and his associates’ names will be in every paper, their good characters dragged through the mud,” Alice added smugly.
So, the world was not completely bereft of integrity. Even the richest, most powerful men still had to bow before the scales of justice. With the resurrection men no longer a threat, perhaps she could work to prove Caleb’s innocence. Hope surged through her. Then Caleb could come back a free man—if he hadn’t already started a new life for himself somewhere with a wife and family. She pushed the stomach-turning thought away.
“Alice,” she said slowly, “how did you know all those things about Mr. Whitby and Rose? And who is Mr. Pope?”
The smile faded from her sister’s lips. “For all his mad ideas, Mr. Whitby was right about one thing: I only had to go deep inside of myself to find what has always been there, what I have never before tried to harness.”
“You used your gift,” Tabby said. “You looked into the future.” Alice nodded, and Tabby considered this. “What did you see?” she asked.
Alice looked swiftly away. “I saw what became of Mr. Whitby.”
“And Mr. Pope? Who was he?”
“A man to whom I owe money for cards,” Alice said. Then she brightened. “Eli is waiting in the other room. He said he didn’t want to interrupt our reunion.”
Tabby couldn’t help smiling; that sounded like him. “Would you send him in now, please?”
Alice gave Tabby’s hand one more squeeze before she went to fetch Eli.
The door creaked back open, and Eli’s familiar scent of pipe tobacco washed over her. “Hello, Tabby cat. You gave us a fright.”
Reaching out her hand, Tabby felt Eli’s close around hers, reassuring and firm. “I know, I’m sorry,” she said. “It was the last thing I wanted to do.”
Eli gave a little snort. “There you go again, worrying about me when it’s supposed to be the other way round.” He smoothed back her hair, looking at her with something between pride and awe. “I always knew my Tabby cat was special.”
“You know...” she said before trailing off.
“Alice and Mary-Ruth told me everything.”
So, he had finally learned about her sight. He didn’t seem hurt, yet Tabby couldn’t help the guilt that sat heavy on her heart. “I should have told you, I don’t know why I didn’t. It’s not that I didn’t trust you, it’s just that—”
He stopped her. “Hush now, I understand. It’s a hard world and you got to do what you got to do to protect yourself. No reason to feel guilty about that.” He looked down at his hands, massaging the knotty fingers. “I do wish you would have told me. Hell, I wish you would have felt safe knowing you could trust me, but I understand. I know how a secret can sit with you, weigh you down, and eat at your soul.”
Nodding, she fiddled with the edge of her worn quilt. When she was younger, she had traced the faded geometric pattern of pink and blue triangles with her fingers, marveling at the dainty appliqués and relishing the feeling of something soft and homey after the coldness of the crypt. Her secret had been a cold and heavy mantle, but Eli’s secret had meant life and death. How could she begrudge him keeping it from her?
“There’s something that I’ve kept from you, Tabby,” he said, as if reading her mind.
She would do anything to spare him the heartache of saying it. “They told me,” she said softly.
He nodded, as if this didn’t surprise him in the least. “Huh. So you know. They know, too. Here I thought I was invisible.”
“I don’t think they would dare send you back, not now.”
* * *
Eli let out a long breath, tenting his fingers and looking off into the corner. “When I reached free soil, I thought that it would all be over, that I would start new and leave the past behind. But it haunts me, how could it not? That pain is in my bones, my blood. When I found you, I saw something of myself in you. I wanted to help someone, and you were there, an orphan just as I had been.”
Tabby blinked back tears. Eli was being kind, as he always was. Tabby had been made an orphan by tragic circumstances, yes, but they had been by chance, a terrible accident. Eli had been made an orphan by systematic cruelty, by an institution that took pleasure in ripping children from their parents. That he saw the two of them as kindred spirits spoke more to his bottomless well of compassion than anything else.
Silence lapped up around them, until Eli stretched out his legs, the chair creaking. “Well, if I’m to stay, there’s things I put off too long as it is. There’s something I need to tell you.”
“What is it?”
He rubbed at his graying tufts of hair as he often did when he didn’t want to come right out and say something. “The thing is, I’ve asked Miss Suze to marry me.”
Tabby blinked, stunned, as Eli rushed on, uncharacteristically tripping over his words. “She’s plenty of room for the two of us to be comfortable. She says she doesn’t want me working anymore, not with my back the state that it is. Of course, I’ll make sure that you’re looked after and you’ll always be welcome and—”
Tabby stopped him, throwing her arms around him and burying her face in his neck. “I’m so happy for you. And just try to keep me away.”
Alice and Mary-Ruth had returned, the small room crowded with laughter and well-wishes. When they quieted down again, Mary-Ruth reached out and placed a hesitant hand on her leg. “Tabs, there’s something else you should know. Well, two somethings.”
“Just how long was I asleep for?” Tabby said, trying for a light tone. “It seems that the world has been quite busy.”
She expected that Mary-Ruth would smile at this, but her friend’s usually sparkling demeanor was dead serious.
“Caleb is back in the country. In Boston, in fact.”
Mary-Ruth looked like she had more to say, but Tabby was already scrambling upright, questions falling off her tongue as fast as her mind could form them.
“How? When?”
Caleb was back in the same city as her, under the same sky and walking the same streets. The last time she had seen him he had laughed at her, accused her of that which she had always been afraid. Some stubborn corner of her mind told her that he didn’t deserve a second chance. But something else, something deeper and centered in her heart, told her that she needed to see him one more time, to give him one more chance.
“He’s in prison, Tabby. He walked right up to the police station in an effort to find out where y—”
Mary-Ruth stopped herself, but Tabby knew what she was going to say. He had walked into the police station to try to find her. She sank back into the pillows, her elation evaporating. Stupid man, to come back here when he knew he would be thrown right back in jail. Yet she couldn’t be angry at him, not when he’d done it for her.
* * *
Dressed in her Sunday best, Tabby called on the prison the next day. Her best was still rather shabby, but when she thought of the beautiful blue gown that she had worn at Mr. Whitby’s demonstration, she was grateful for its familiar comfort. The worn heels of her boots softly clicked down the dreary prison corridor, the warden at her side.
They turned onto the corridor where Caleb was being held, and the damp walls, the stench, the shouts of men, all fell away as soon as her gaze landed on him.
His curly hair had grown shaggy and his face narrower, but he was still the beautiful, golden boy who had brought light with him into the cemetery all those years ago. He didn’t look older, but more poised, sober.
But what if he didn’t feel the same? Alice had told her that they’d met in Edinburgh, an
d that he had been working as a clerk in an architectural firm. He’d come back, yes, but now he was in prison; would he resent her?
His face slowly transformed when he met her gaze. “Tabby,” he said on the back of his breath. “You look...” he trailed off, but his eyes said everything that his words could not, and heat rushed to her cheeks as his gaze swept over her. He cleared his throat, looking as dazed as Tabby felt. “Mary-Ruth visited me, told me everything. I hope that you’re not hurt from your ordeal?”
Tabby shook her head. “Just a little tired. I’ll be fine.”
“I’m glad,” he said.
Why were her feet suddenly made out of lead? He was standing right up against the bars, his hands clasped tight around them. The warden was chatting with an officer a little way away, and the moment was as private as they were like to have, so why couldn’t she go to him? And why wasn’t he saying anything more than the barest pleasantries?
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said bluntly. “You did nothing wrong.” What little faith she’d had in the police and the rule of law was further shaken every time she saw Caleb sitting in his cell. “They’ve arrested Mr. Whitby and his accomplices. They must know you’re innocent.”
“Innocent of murder, perhaps, but I am still an escaped convict. I made the police look incompetent.” He gave her his old roguish smile. “I doubt that they’re eager to see me on the streets again.”
The straw rustled as a rat scurried across the cell, and Tabby took a deep breath, willing herself to be patient. “Surely your mother can speak on your behalf to the court?”
He shrugged.
“But Caleb,” she said, her voice rising, “you must at least try!”
He looked away, watching as the rat gnawed on something in the corner. “Has it occurred to you that perhaps I am right where I belong? That I deserve to be here?”
“What are you talking about?”
He gave a heavy sigh and kicked at some straw. “Do you know what gave me the will to survive my exile?”
