by Tessa Harris
“I knew he were a gonna,” cried the youth.
Crouch bent down and lifted the material. “Not much meat on him, but he’s fresh enough,” he concluded.
Hartnett smiled, feeling pleased with himself.
“Now get him up quick, or the others’ll be turning before we get shut o’ them.”
The young man unfolded a hessian sack that he’d brought out of his topcoat and began stuffing the bundle into it as if it were straw while his master held the lantern aloft, all the time looking around him.
Between them they carried the sack back the way they had come, down to the end of the lane and around the corner once more to where a hay cart was waiting. They then heaved the cargo on board, where it joined three other sacks of a similar size, extinguished the lantern, and drove off down the road by the light of the moon.
Half an hour later they arrived at Leicester Fields and were met by the swarthy servant.
“Another lot for the doctor, Howison,” growled Crouch, jumping down from the cart. Once inside the gates, Hartnett heaved the sacks into the cold store one by one, dumping them without ceremony on the stone slabs. A dull thud sounded each time a head hit the ground. Outside, Crouch held out his hand to Howison for payment, and a few guineas were deposited in his palm. Seemingly satisfied, he had just turned to leave when the servant called him back.
“Wait up,” he said, beckoning. “Not so fast, fella. There’s a special job for ye.”
Chapter 9
Lady Charlesworth received Thomas in the darkened drawing room of her spacious town house. A small dog sat at her feet.
“How kind of you to call, Dr. Silkstone,” she said softly. He was surprised at how young she looked, despite the puffiness around her eyes from shedding so many tears.
“I am so sorry for your loss,” he said, clasping the widow’s cold hand to kiss it. He had been meaning to call on her sooner, but his unexpected visit to Boughton Hall meant that almost a week had elapsed since the funeral.
“My husband’s death took us all by surprise,” she sighed.
Thomas nodded. “I was speaking with him only the week before. He seemed well enough then,” he ventured. There were no physical signs of any illness that he could recall. “In fact, he had asked me to meet with him. I felt there was something he wanted to discuss,” said Thomas. “Perhaps he had concerns about his own health,” he suggested.
“That may well have been, Dr. Silkstone. He had complained to me about pains in his chest, but he was under much strain at the hospital,” she told him; then, leaning forward in a confidential manner, she said, “I think there was some infighting.”
Thomas had heard as much and knew firsthand how cruel and bitter his own profession could be, especially if prestigious hospital posts were at stake.
“I had begged him to take to his bed that day. He had one of his headaches, but he insisted on seeing Dr. Hunter in his study,” said the widow.
“Dr. Hunter?” echoed Thomas.
“Yes, the two of them were in the study when Sir Tobias was taken ill.”
“I see,” said Thomas. “That was fortunate indeed that the doctor should have been on hand.”
The widow bent down and picked up the small dog that was pawing at her skirts. She placed it on her knee and stroked it. It looked up at her with guileless eyes. “My husband was going to discuss some changes he was going to make at the hospital with Dr. Hunter.”
“Changes?” repeated Thomas. “Do you know what sort of changes, your ladyship?”
She stroked the dog. “I was not privy to my husband’s plans for St. George’s, Dr. Silkstone.”
Thomas felt duly chastised for asking too many questions.
“Poor Pixie here was most upset at the time,” she continued. “She came barking to fetch me, didn’t you, darling? But it was too late. The master was gone.”
Thomas nodded sympathetically. He had to respect the widow’s unquestioning acceptance of her husband’s untimely death. To him, however, it seemed a strange coincidence that Sir Tobias died so suddenly on the eve of bringing in major reforms at St. George’s. To add to these nagging suspicions, from what he had heard, he doubted very much that even Sir Tobias’s corpse had escaped John Hunter’s scalpel, with or without his prior consent.
With this in mind, instead of returning directly to his rooms, Thomas decided to go via St. James’s Church in nearby Jermyn Street. It was here that Sir Tobias’s death would have been recorded. The young doctor was a familiar face to the parish clerk. He was all too often called to register a death of a patient himself.
Looking down the pages of the ledger in the silence of the vestry, Thomas soon found what he was looking for: the entry relating to Sir Tobias. It was just as he anticipated. There was his name, the place of his death, his date of birth, and his occupation. As expected, the name of the doctor who attended was given as Dr. John Hunter, and in the sixth column, under the cause of death, was written “angina.” This was certainly consistent with Lady Charlesworth’s version of events, Thomas told himself. Nor did the entry in the final column come to him as any surprise. The death was “uncertified.” John Hunter had seen to it that there was no official postmortem.
Thomas returned to Hollen Street just in time to prepare for a thorough examination of Charles Byrne. At Boughton Hall he felt he had managed to win the giant’s trust, but now, surrounded by his instruments and textbooks, he knew he would be able to undertake a reasoned and informed investigation.
At the duly appointed time, Mistress Finesilver arrived at the door with his new patient. He was accompanied by the count.
“I shall wait outside, Dr. Silkstone,” assured the little man. Thomas was relieved. What he feared he might have to tell the giant was in the utmost confidence, and it was clear to him that he remained ill at ease, surrounded by the paraphernalia of medicine. His patient’s eyes flashed from one specimen jar to another with a growing sense of panic.
“I think we will be more comfortable in here,” suggested Thomas, motioning him into a small room that he sometimes used for his female patients. There was a sofa, a dressing screen, a rug on the floor, and a high window that was inaccessible to prying eyes.
Anticipating the giant’s unease, Thomas had already transferred all the instruments he would need into the room.
“It is good of you to come, Mr. Byrne,” he said, motioning to a chair. “I understand your dislike of my profession, but I can assure you I am only here to help you.”
The giant nodded his large head and sat on the sofa, which creaked under his weight. Thomas took out of the table drawer a notebook and pencil and proceeded to write.
“I shall ask you a few questions first, before I examine you. How old are you, Mr. Byrne?”
“I be twenty-one years,” he replied.
“And where do you live in Ireland?”
“In a place called Littlebridge, near Derry.”
“And do you have family?”
“I have a mother, sir, and was robbed of my father.”
Thomas saw grief crumple his pale face.
“Do you know of anyone else in your neighborhood who is as tall?”
The giant paused to think. “I do that.” He nodded. “Not five miles away. The Knipe brothers.”
Thomas noted the fact. “And are you related?”
The giant shook his head slowly, then said helpfully: “No, but ’tis said we was all begat on top of a haystack.”
Thomas smiled and nodded. It did not surprise him that such superstitions existed. “I will need to take measurements and weigh you. Is this acceptable to you?” he asked.
Byrne looked apprehensive. “It will not hurt,” Thomas assured him. “But I would ask you to slip off your coat and your shoes so that I can be more accurate.”
Standing on a stool, Thomas, using a tape measure, recorded the giant’s height at eight feet two inches. His hands were eighteen inches long from the wrist to the middle finger.
“And now
, Mr. Byrne, I need to examine you in little more detail,” he said. Again, standing on a chair, he looked into the giant’s mouth. He saw that his teeth were in a poor state and that several were missing, presumably because they had been extracted. His tonsils were also very large and pustulated, indicating to Thomas some form of infection.
It was an examination of the thoracic cavity, however, that Thomas was most eager to undertake. He had recently devised a form of ear trumpet that enabled him to listen to the beat of a man’s heart and the sound of his lungs as they inflated and deflated. The idea had come to him when his father had given him a large knobbed whelk shell acquired on his travels along the New Jersey shore. He had been only ten years old at the time, but already he knew he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps and study medicine. Like all children he had put the shell to his ear to listen for the sound of the ocean. He heard it, of course, or imagined he did, but he wanted to hear more, and as he grew into manhood, so, too, grew the notion of being able to listen to the inner machinations of the human oceans that lie within the body. His wooden ear horn enabled him to listen past the gurglings of the trachea and the rumblings of the stomach and journey into the inner cavern of the rib cage that housed the lungs. This would be the perfect occasion for its first real trial.
The giant looked at him suspiciously as he held the strange contraption in his hand. “Could you open your shirt, Mr. Byrne?” asked Thomas. “I hope to listen to your lungs.”
His reluctant patient obliged and Thomas set to work. Putting the widest part of the cone onto the bare chest, he closed his eyes. He could hear the sound of the ocean, of waves washing against a shore, but beyond that there was more. There was the sound of a rhythmical rattle, a telltale rasp coming from the lungs that to him cried out just one word—tuberculosis.
That night six men met in an upper room at St. George’s. Sir Oliver De Vere, the new chief surgeon, a cunning politician who would always play one man off against another for his own gain, sat at the head of a long table. Now that Sir Tobias was gone they could formulate a plan. John Hunter was too arrogant. John Hunter was too powerful. John Hunter was bringing their profession into disrepute, embracing newfangled instruments and unproven hypotheses, expostulating absurd theories, and even consorting with known criminals. Their list of grievances against him was endless.
To start, this John Hunter dared to challenge the great Galen. Thomas Keate spoke out: “Surely, it is a universally held truth that all illnesses stem from an imbalance of bodily humors? He would challenge that, sir!” he told Sir Oliver.
“What cheek, what audacity!” cried John Gunning.
But there was more. This philistine, this Scotchman, eschewed the time-honored tradition of bloodletting, that most versatile means of both prevention and cure of almost every imaginable ill. “He would deny this most basic principle,” wailed William Walker, his head in his hands.
“And instead of inducing a healing pus, he would allow wounds to scab over,” added Gunning indignantly once more.
Worse still, Hunter was pressing for free lectures to be delivered to students, allowing them to practice their craft on real corpses. Sir Tobias had fallen into his trap and had been about to grant his wish when he so conveniently gave up the ghost. As if the practice of dissection could ever further the art of anatomy. “He grows too big for his boots!” exclaimed Everard Home, Hunter’s son-in-law, and they all shouted “Aye!” in agreement.
Apart from their professional differences of opinion, there was, of course, the matter of the Scotchman’s upbringing and origins. He was not one of them. He had not attended a good school, nor even been educated in the classics. He had shunned elocution lessons and spoke in his coarse Scottish Lowland burr. How could a surgeon take the Hippocratic Oath when, in all probability, he did not have an inkling as to the character or background of the great Hippocrates himself, they asked. He was terse in manner and sharp of tongue. He did not hold back in his criticism of them and spoke his mind far too freely. A soft humor and a winning smile were not his way. His conceited insolence and insufferable vanity, they said, were out of hand. Yet his physical appearance, disheveled and unkempt, with no notion of fashion or flair, showed him to be of a base and vulgar disposition.
There were rumors, too. Rumors they found very easy to believe; that he consorted with the lowest sort in taverns and did deals with resurrectionists to procure his corpses. “We’ve all been known to do that when times are hard,” admitted Walker, “but these footpads, coves, and cutpurses he treats almost as his equals.”
Keate agreed, banging his fist on the table. “He is nothing more than a cozening mountebank and a dilettante quack, and his ‘work,’ such as it is, is damaging our reputation and tarnishing our profession.”
Sir Oliver, who had been listening attentively in silence, now held their attention. “You are right, gentlemen. Something must be done,” he concurred, nodding his elegant head emphatically. “But what?”
Chapter 10
At first only a handful gathered ’round to look. Then, as those who could read saw the notices pinned on trees and affixed to doors, the news began to travel from Covent Garden, out to Holborn, Ludgate Hill, and beyond.
“Mr. Byrne, the surprising Irish Giant, the tallest man in the world . . . ,” proclaimed the posters. This extraordinary spectacle, the reader was told, was to present himself at the cane shop next to Cox’s Museum in Spring Gardens for the delectation of the nobility and gentry for the princely sum of half a crown each person.
“ ’Tis said the giant has to take a walk when ’tis dark so as not to affright anyone,” confided one of the motley onlookers to her neighbor.
Another woman trumped that. “ ’Tis nothing,” she chimed. “I’ve heard night watchmen have see’d him take the tops off street lamps and light his pipe by the flame.”
A third smiled and said: “Well, I’ve heard he’s hung like a donkey,” and all of them cackled like a gaggle of fishwives.
Talk of the giant’s physical attributes had also traveled to the Temple of Venus, a pleasure palace run by a libidinous fraudster, James Graham.
“You have an invitation to try out his famous celestial bed!” cried the count, flourishing a large card in front of Charles’s nose on the morning of his first public exhibition. He was standing with Thomas in the drawing room of his Cockspur Street lodgings. The giant, however, remained less than enthusiastic.
“I am not versed in the ways of Venus, sir,” he replied languidly.
“Come, come, Mr. Byrne. I have heard great reports of Mr. Graham’s temple. Delights that are out of this world.” The little man nudged his friend suggestively, but he remained unmoved.
While Thomas did not share the count’s enthusiasm for such bawdy pleasures, he still had his misgivings as to the giant’s health. Charles sat looking morose in the corner. Yet still he refused to entertain Thomas’s suggestion that he rest for a few days. He appeared determined to go ahead with his plans, and no amount of persuasion seemed to be able to divert him from his purpose.
Boruwlaski looked at the timepiece on the wall. “Three hours to go. Just time for a good shave,” he declared. “I shall take you to my barber in St. James’s. He will make you look like a veritable Adonis,” he told Charles.
The giant, however, was less than eager. “I don’t want no b-barber shaving me, sir,” he muttered. The count looked at the uneven growth on his broad face and frowned. “But we must have you looking your best, dear friend,” he exclaimed.
“I’ll not go to a barber’s, sir,” said Charles Byrne, clearly brooking no argument. There was a hint of aggression in his voice that Thomas had not heard before.
Unhappy at this rebuff, Boruwlaski tugged indignantly at his waistcoat. “Well, I shall certainly go. There is nothing like a good shave to make a man feel civilized,” he said, his tiny chin jutting out in defiance. He turned to Thomas. “Will you join me, Dr. Silkstone?”
The young doctor was slightly taken
aback by the invitation. He had not intended to go for a shave, but after a short pause, he agreed. “I should like that.” He smiled, feeling the light growth on his own chin.
The count nodded. “Then we shall take ourselves to see Monsieur Dubois this very instant,” he concluded, and with that he left the room.
Thomas looked at his patient half apologetically as he remained in his seat. “We shall return before noon,” he assured him. The giant nodded.
The red and white striped pole outside a bow-fronted shop in St. James’s signified that Monsieur Francois Dubois was a practitioner of the art of barbering. It also signified blood and bandages. Thomas recalled hearing tales from the days of the barber-surgeons from his father, who was also a surgeon. Just before he was born, these men with no education or training would perform the duties of a physician: bloodletting, pulling teeth, and giving clysters. In Thomas’s opinion, the Act of Parliament that separated the two companies had not come before time. Nowadays barbers brandished razor blades instead of scalpels and applied pomades instead of poultices. It was a great advancement, he told himself as he stepped into the small salon with the count by his side.
The first thing that struck him was the smell, the sickly-sweet perfume that wafted about the place, pungent, yet pleasant. He detected notes of sandalwood, musk, and exotic spices. Large flacons and apothecary jars were ranged on shelves around the salon. They reminded him of his own laboratory. There were even weighing scales so that Monsieur Dubois could, no doubt, concoct the olfactory sensations for which he was so renowned, the voluptuous scents of civet and ambergris that masked a multitude of malodors. His mastery of his art and its accoutrements had made him the talk first of Paris and now of London. Accordingly the more savvy gentlemen about town would bring their stubbly faces and their bulging purses to this most trusted and deft barber and emerge feeling smooth, scented, and sensuous.
