by Tessa Harris
Was Dr. Hunter really capable of such a gruesome crime, he asked himself. He had already proved himself to be totally irrational in his behavior toward Charles. Setting his man on him to shadow the giant day and night was a cruel and heinous act. He was playing games of the mind, taunting him, just as a childish bully would in a schoolroom.
The dividing line between genius and madness was a thin one, he knew, but could such a man turn from a committed anatomist to a scheming murderer? He was inclined to think not, but then he was reminded of the vile syringe that Carrington had discovered. Who in his right mind would infect himself willingly with such a scourge? The answer was, surely, no one in his right mind.
He was reminded, too, of the episode involving Mr. Haydn that was reported by Carrington. That he should ever countenance manhandling a close acquaintance against his will in order to perform a potentially life-threatening surgery would also be inconceivable to any sane man.
Thomas sat down at his desk and ran his fingers through his hair in a gesture of despair, and his thoughts turned to his beloved Lydia. Since his return from Boughton four days ago, he had heard nothing. He would go back as soon as he was able, but he needed news from Carrington before he could leave London, even it was only for a few meager days, to be by Lydia’s side.
His beloved had now been in a coma for seven days, and he knew that with each passing day, hope of her full recovery faded. Yet he refused to give up. He watched Franklin shuffle across his desk, nudging papers and sniffing the air, oblivious to the fact that his master’s world was so chaotic and traumatic. A copy of the Morning Herald lay on his desk. Mistress Finesilver must have put it there while he was at St. George’s. Feeling in need of a diversion, Thomas opened the newspaper and scanned it. In amongst news of the war in his homeland and the domestic squabbles of Whigs and Tories, he came across several advertisements that vied for the attention of Londoners. In Piccadilly, a Mr. Katterfelto offered punters the chance to see insects in all manner of liquids through his greatly improved solar microscope, and in Spring Gardens, a few doors away from where Charles was exhibiting his mighty physiognomy, spectators could be treated to an extraordinary mind reader. Mr. Breslaw declared he could command a fresh egg to dance on a stick by itself to the accompaniment of a violin and mandolin. Such weird and wonderful claims managed to bring a smile to Thomas’s lips. But a little farther down, his attention was caught by a much larger advertisement. Another giant, by the name of Patrick Cotter O’Brien, was coming to town. He was, according to the newspaper, a direct descendant of Brian Boru, the ancient king of Ireland. To view this unique spectacle, the esteemed public need only pay one shilling. Worse still, it was claimed he was a full four inches taller than Charles Byrne.
Chapter 37
Like an artist surrounded by all the paraphernalia of his craft, Giles Carrington sat at a table in Dr. Hunter’s laboratory, encircled by all the tools of anatomical preservation. There were pipes and pipettes, brass wires and bristles, and there were reeds and syringes for the delicate task of injecting blood vessels, highlighting them in different colors to expose their diverse routes around the specimen.
His master had given him the job of preparing a coil of human intestine that sat like a sleeping snake in front of him. He did not know how the specimen had been obtained, but he could guess. Nevertheless, he did not question. He simply injected the vessels with warm water to flush out the blood and dispel any air. Into the open end of the coil he inserted a pipe and held it securely with pins before reaching for his syringe and injecting the wax he had colored earlier. Vermilion, blue verditer, and king’s yellow were hues on his artist’s palette.
With the utmost care and precision, on the depression of his syringe, miraculous pathways would appear before him in color, routes taken by blood and bile not visible to the naked eye. Lacy lanes of blues and reds would dart hither and thither, reaching to the farthest edges of the tissue—the wonder of the human body played out before his very eyes.
He was sitting back admiring his artistry when he heard the door latch click and in walked Dr. Hunter. His shoulders were hunched and he looked to be in a sour mood, as usual, before a sudden twinge of pain seemed to stop him in his tracks and he doubled over, steadying himself on a nearby chair. Carrington had seen this happen before. He wondered if it was the burning of the pox.
Righting himself, Hunter walked toward his pupil and stopped to hook a pair of spectacles onto his nose. He peered at the specimen over Carrington’s shoulder.
“Did ya not use rhinoceros hair?” he snarled, prodding the intestine.
“Goose quill, sir,” replied Carrington nervously.
“Sloppy work, young man. Sloppy. Ya’ll need to do better than that,” he remarked before moving toward a cupboard. Opening the door, he paused, selected a flint glass jar containing a lizard with a double tail, then exited the room without another word.
Carrington watched him go, loathing the old man with every fiber of his being. Nothing was ever good enough for him. No wonder he was so hated at St. George’s, with his brusque manner and crude tongue. Now was his chance. Reaching down to the drawer in the desk, he took out a key and went to the door in the wall. Opening it with ease, he was immediately hit by the stench of rancid fluids. Recovering himself, he adjusted his eyes to the darkness. Inside, ranged on two shelves, were at least a twoscore of sample jars. There were organs: bulbous hearts, livers, kidneys, and spongy brains that floated serenely in yellow preserving fluid. There were digits, too, disembodied fingers and toes. He had seen Hunter enter this secret lair before, carrying glass flasks and cylinders, but he had no idea as to the extent of the collection.
He moved closer, leaving the door slightly ajar so that a shard of light illuminated the shelves. There were more organs, eyes and even teeth, but what really distinguished this array of samples from the others was the labeling. In large, clear script each jar carried not only a number and a Latin name, it carried the name of a human, too. There was the brain of Daniel Solander, a coiled length of artery from Sir Tobias Charlesworth, and the heart of the Marquis of Rockingham. Like some great Papist reliquary, John Hunter had taken it upon himself to preserve the organs and body parts of the great and the noble in his own private shrine. Whether or not the deceased or their loved ones had given permission for such unorthodox practices, Carrington could not tell. All he knew was that if the constables were to find a jar containing the larynx of the young Carlo Cappelli, then this crazed surgeon would not only be an anatomist to the dead, but a murderer of the living.
He scanned the shelves once more to find the perfect place, then reached ahead of him. And now there it was. Not so clearly visible as to attract immediate attention and half-hidden by a jar. It was not injected with colored dyes like the other samples, suggesting haste. Nor was it labeled with a name. That would have been far too incriminating. Yet, it was the only larynx, as far as he could see, in the collection, and someone of Dr. Silkstone’s forensic ability would be able to say, with scientific certainty, that the parts had once belonged to the young castrato because of their unique characteristics.
Now all that remained was to show Dr. Silkstone this remarkable and damning discovery and Dr. John Hunter, the maverick anatomist, the enemy of St. George’s, and the scourge of the establishment, would be charged with murder. In all probability, his body would be dissected by that august body of men, the Corporation of Surgeons. They would relish every slice of the scalpel, every probe of their forceps. How very ironic. How very fitting, he thought to himself, as he locked the door behind him and returned the key to the drawer.
Chapter 38
Charles Byrne sat forlornly in a chair by the window, looking out onto the square and, more precisely, onto Dr. Hunter’s man below, still propped up against a tree as he had been for so many days now. At the giant’s side was a bottle of gin and on his lap was a small sketchbook. In his large hand he wielded a pencil with great difficulty, his thumb and forefinger struggling to gri
p the delicate drawing instrument.
He looked up when Emily entered the room. On the count’s instructions, Mistress Goodbody had been much more lenient toward the girl. If the giant wished her company, then that was perfectly acceptable, her master had said. Charles’s health was fast fading and his melancholy mood needed to be lifted if possible. The arrival of the new giant meant that his own audience had dwindled, and he had even been forced to move premises and reduce his admission fee.
“You are drawing, Charles,” said Emily, delight and surprise mingling in her voice. She peered ’round his shoulder. “What is it?” But she frowned as soon as she could make out the image.
“ ’Tis my coffin,” he replied taciturnly.
“But, Charles,” she chided him, “you must not think of death.”
He shook his large, sleek head and sighed. “ ’Twill be knocking at my door soon,” he said. “And when it does, I don’t want that devil, Hunter, to have my body.”
Emily’s expression was tinged with sadness. She reached out and put her hand on his arm. “You know we will not let that happen.”
He nodded. “That is why I am making plans.” His voice was suddenly more purposeful as he looked at his sketch pad. “I am to be buried at sea,” he told her. “My coffin is to be of lead. It must be taken to the mouth of the Thames and sunk so that no one, not Hunter nor any of those baying dogs that call themselves surgeons, can get their filthy hands on my corpse.”
Emily regarded Charles, teary-eyed. “ ’Tis a good plan. Have you told Dr. Silkstone and the count?”
“They will know soon enough,” he said softly, reaching for her hand. “My time is near, Emily.”
Somewhere from within the deep labyrinth of Lydia’s mind, light began to filter. It was almost imperceptible at first; the blackness changed to dark blue. Still there was nothing. No sight, no sound, but an altered state, then slowly, very slowly, the brightness began to creep, its probing fingers searching for any rocky ledges, any fragments of being it could find to cling on to.
The colors gradually changed from blue to green to yellow, until finally she could see shapes. They were blurred at first, their outlines melding into the background, but soon they became confident in their own forms, defined and sharp and real.
Now she entered her own personal reality. She could see herself in a small, unfamiliar room. Her husband was with her. She was anxious, crying, but she did not know why. He gave her a gill of brandy. She sipped it and her throat burned, but he urged her to drink more, tilting her head back with his hands. She drank, and as she did so, she became less aware of her body, her legs seeming almost weightless. She felt him unfastening her clothes, loosening her stays, but she let him, because she was becoming powerless, senseless.
He carried her into another room. She felt the cold on her bare arms and smelled a harsh, metallic smell in her nostrils. There was an old man and, behind him, a fat woman. The old man, his hair tawny and flecked with gray, said something in a strange accent before Michael laid her on the table. The woman placed a black veil over her face so that the colors left her, obscured by the dark mesh. Now she saw only shapes. She was frightened and she called out for her husband, but he had gone.
The fat woman forced some black, foul-tasting liquid down her throat that made her head spin. She heard her own cries grow feebler as rough hands pulled up her petticoat, exposing her lower abdomen. She wanted to lash out and to sit up, but they had strapped her down, fastening leather thongs with metal buckles that cut into her skin around her wrists and ankles if she tried to move.
She saw the man come to her with cupped hands. He put them over her lower belly as if searching for something; a sound, a movement, then after a few moments he made a mark with ink. She let out a faint cry, but try as she might, she could not move.
“ ’Twill all be over soon,” said a voice. “Just a wee prick.”
And still he came toward her with a long, hollow needle clasped in his hands. She saw it hover over her and she saw him plunge it down, piercing the mound of her rounding belly.
“Lydia! Oh, my dearest Lydia!” Sir Theodisius detected movement. He saw her eyelids flicker and her lips part and the look of horror on her face. He grasped her hand in his. “Lydia. Lydia. ’Tis your Uncle Theo,” he soothed.
Heaving himself up from his chair as fast as his corpulent frame would allow, he shambled over to the door and called down the hallway to anyone who would listen. “She wakes. Her ladyship wakes!”
Nurse Pring was in the next room, taking a well-earned nap, but on hearing the cries she rushed to Lydia’s side. She found her patient in an agitated state, her head rolling from side to side on her pillow, her face set in a frown, and her thin voice calling out through parched lips.
Dipping a sponge in water, the nurse let droplets fall onto her mouth. Lydia licked her lips. “More,” she croaked.
“We need to call for Dr. Fairweather, sir,” Nurse Pring told Sir Theodisius, who duly obeyed the implicit order.
In the meantime, Lydia had opened her eyes fully. Her expression was less pained, but she still looked apprehensive.
“Who are you?” she enquired of Nurse Pring.
“I am your nurse, your ladyship. You have been very unwell, but please God, you will soon be restored,” she said, smiling.
Lydia’s eyes darted ’round the room. “Where is this place?”
“Why, ’tis your home. Boughton Hall, my lady.”
“Boughton Hall,” she repeated, as if the name were unfamiliar to her.
“And what day is it?”
“Why, it is a Tuesday and you have been in a deep sleep for these past ten days,” replied the nurse.
At that moment Sir Theodisius returned to the room, a wide grin stretching his fat cheeks. “I have summoned Dr. Fairweather,” he said, walking toward the bed once more.
“Thank you, sir,” said Nurse Pring, measuring out a draft that Thomas had left for Lydia when, or if, she awoke.
“And I have sent word to Dr. Silkstone. I am sure he will be here just as soon as he can, my dear,” he said to Lydia, easing himself once more into his bedside chair. But Lydia did not return his smile. She simply looked blankly at him.
“Dr. Silkstone? Who is Dr. Silkstone?” she said.
Chapter 39
Folded carefully inside the pocket of Charles Byrne’s topcoat was a very special piece of paper. It was white and measured half the size of an average pocket kerchief, but it bore the moniker of the Bank of England. It was worth more than seven hundred pounds.
That evening, when all was quiet and the count was dining with his society friends, the giant took a carriage and headed toward Haymarket. He did not feel strong. He had endured several bouts of coughing that day and he knew his condition was worsening. He had given up all hope of the lawyer, Marchant, being able to obtain a posthumous pardon for his father, so he had grudgingly paid him the money he owed him. His hope, although admittedly a slim one, was that His Majesty King George would keep to his word and take up the matter with his Minister of Justice.
At around nine o’clock he arrived at the Cock Tavern. Naturally when he walked in, the drinkers and the hussies all stopped what they were about to stare at him. Even the fiddle player fell silent. He was used to such behavior, and while it always made him feel uncomfortable, he knew straight away where he was heading.
Mad Sam O’Shea sat in a corner with four or five other men, all of them jug-bitten. There were women with them, too, sitting on their laps or seats nearby. One had her bubbies out. They were laughing and carousing, but when Charles caught the other Irishman’s eye, the merriment melted away.
“Be gone, now, I say,” cried the wayward hawker to a trollop who had draped herself ’round his shoulders. The other women followed suit. Tugging at his topcoat in a businesslike manner, O’Shea gestured to the settle next to him that had been occupied by two of the doxies.
“Charles, my dear friend, I got your message, sure I did.” He smil
ed.
The giant was surprised to be received in such a familiar way, but he returned the smile to his fellow countryman. He sat down on the settle, stretching his mighty legs out in front of him.
“You need my help, is that so?” asked Mad Sam, his eyes as bright as gemstones. Emily had sent word to her father that Charles was in need of a great favor, but that he would make it worth his while.
“I am not sure if Emily told you, s-sir, but I am not long for this world.”
Mad Sam shrugged and crossed himself. “None of us are, Lord bless us,” he slurred.
Charles continued: “There are those surgeons that would c-cut up my body when I am dead, sir, and put it on p-public show, like some common criminal. They would deny me entry into heaven, sir, so they would.”
“I have heard the talk, Giant. You are a wanted man, ’tis true.” He nodded sympathetically. “So tell me, what do you propose?”
Thomas was at work in his study, assiduously going through his notes on Carlo Cappelli’s postmortem, as Franklin scurried about in the corner. He wondered how Carrington was faring, if he had managed to gain access to Hunter’s secret store. Then, as if someone were reading his thoughts, Mistress Finesilver appeared at the door and announced there was a young gentleman to see him. It was Giles Carrington. He walked in looking nervous and worried, fingering the brim of his tricorn hat as he sat down.
“You have news?” asked Thomas eagerly.
“I am afraid I do, sir,” came the reply. “I went into the storeroom and I found it was full of more samples; human samples.”
“Go on,” urged Thomas.
“It is as we feared, sir,” said Carrington, looking grave. “There was a jar containing a larynx.”
