Stoker, who had been studying his industrious little dermestids, merely shrugged. “So we pursue another line of inquiry.”
His tone was sullen, and altogether we had exchanged fewer than a dozen words throughout the morning. He had spent the better part of the time finishing the excavation of his Bactrian with the result that his chest and arms were liberally streaked with glue and sawdust and his hair was streaming with sweat. Manual labor usually had the effect of calming his temper, but in this case, it had merely given him an excuse to indulge in his more destructive tendencies. The Bactrian had been reduced to its filthy skin and a pile of untidy bones. Stoker finished folding the camel hide carefully. He would clean and dry it on a rack he had fashioned specifically for the task, but there was much work to be done first. Every bit of errant sawdust had to be cleaned from the bones and the joints assessed before he made the decision to mount the hide back on the skeleton or sculpt an armature as the new base. What he intended for the tongue and eyes did not bear thinking about.
“What are you going to do with the poor fellow?” I asked, nodding to the heap of sawdust and bones on the floor.
For a moment I thought he would not answer, but he never could resist the opportunity to discuss his work. “I shall reassemble the skeleton for display. Then I will sculpt a base for the hide and mount it, providing I can save the hide at all. The mice have got at it.”
It was a tremendous amount of work; the average taxidermist would have simply mounted the hide over a bit of padding thrown over the creature’s own skeleton. But Stoker was no average taxidermist. His idea of exhibiting the skeletons separately and remounting the hides on metal armatures of his devising was innovative and brilliant. Of course, I did not tell him so. It would not do to inflate his already quite healthy sense of accomplishment.
But a little feminine deference could not fail to sweeten his mood, I decided. I leaned forward in my chair, gently blowing the dust off of a delicate little specimen. “What do you suggest then as an alternate line of inquiry?” I asked casually.
He rubbed thoughtfully at his chin, leaving a dark line of sweat-dampened sawdust along his jaw. “We ought to pursue Mornaday’s hint about Artemisia’s post-mortem.”
He settled himself on the edge of the desk and began to rummage for a bite to eat. I usually kept a tin of honeycomb on hand for emergencies, but it was empty and he grumbled his irritation. “I am sorry. I quite forgot to buy more, but you will keep eating it all,” I told him with a touch of asperity. “That was supposed to be in case of emergency.”
“This is an emergency. I had no breakfast. I came straight down to work, and half a pot of tea is not enough to sustain a man for a job like that,” he told me with a jerk of the chin towards his Bactrian.
“Just a moment, and I will find you something. This wretched Limenitis archippus is masquerading as a Danaus erippus, and not very cleverly.” I corrected the label, penning the accurate identification as Stoker gave a quick cry and dove beneath the morning’s newspaper. He emerged waving a packet triumphantly.
“What have you got there?” I asked, pinning the Limenitis into place with a sigh of satisfaction.
“The last of the funeral biscuits,” he said, tearing into the packet with his teeth. He took out the pair of biscuits inside and crunched one thoughtfully. “Aniseed again,” he said after a moment. “Not my favorite, but not at all bad.”
“And thoroughly ghoulish,” I told him. “All of this rampant morbidity cannot be good.” I picked up the discarded packet. Besides the expected advertisement for the undertakers, there was a short tribute to Artemisia and a picture of a willow bent dolorously over a grave. “There is even a poem—of the most sickeningly sentimental variety,” I pointed out. “It is twaddle.”
“No,” he corrected, plucking the packet from my fingers with shining eyes. “It is a clue.”
He turned the packet around so I could see where he pointed. “‘Messieurs Padgett and Pettifer, Undertakers,’” I read slowly. “Of course! The police surgeons will never speak to us, nor will the investigators. Sir Hugo will have seen to that. Everyone associated with the case in an official capacity will close ranks against us. There is no one to whom we can turn—except the undertakers. However did you think of it?”
He shrugged. “Who knows more about a body than the men who prepare it for burial?”
“Revelstoke Templeton-Vane!” I cried. “God strike me down if ever again I question your intelligence. That is a stroke of brilliance.”
He preened. “It is, isn’t it? I think I shall bask in this for a little while. I do like being right.”
“You are impossible,” I told him, grinning.
“Only the improbable can appreciate the impossible,” he said.
It took him only quarter of an hour to make himself presentable and secure us a cab. It had occurred to both of us that bursting into a respectable undertaking establishment with an eye to asking indiscreet questions was a quick route to getting ourselves thrown out with no progress made upon the investigation. It further occurred to us that it might prove awkward should the undertakers decide to report the matter to Sir Hugo.
“We will go in disguise,” I pronounced.
Stoker gave me a half-smile. “What sort of disguise? I warn you, you will never pass for a corpse. You are far too loquacious.”
“Very funny. We shall outfit ourselves as recently bereaved and in need of the services of Messrs. Padgett and Pettifer.”
He made a token protest, but I had observed during the months of our acquaintance that Stoker was as enthralled by the unexpected as I was. He gave the driver the address of Bunter and Weedman, the warehouse Cherry had mentioned and which provided lavish funeral ensembles for hire to those who could not afford to purchase them outright. Since the death of Prince Albert, unrestrained mourning had been the order of the day, with crêpe draped at the doors and windows of houses touched by loss. Even the poorest wretch could manage a black armband, but those with the means vied to outdo one another in their trappings of grief, hiring ebony horses and equipages for the obsequies, paying funeral mutes and pallbearers to stand witness to their bereavement. Decent coin might be had by those who could look suitably downcast, summoning tears on cue, or those who could heft a coffin to a stout shoulder. The Prince Consort’s death had spawned an industry of loss, from flowers to jewelry, fabric to feathers, and shops across the city hired such things to those who had not the means or inclination to purchase them outright. It was a simple matter to outfit ourselves—Stoker in a suit of black with a tall hat and I in a gown and cape of stark jetty bombazine. The cape fell to my heels, but the thick veil at my bonnet dragged behind, muffling my steps and obscuring my features.
“You look like a ghost bride,” Stoker told me as his gaze swept from the crown of my head to the sweeping hem.
“The nearest to a bride I intend ever to come,” I retorted. He had worn his eye patch, and the effect as a whole was rather sinister.
The outfitting of my funereal garb had taken longer than Stoker’s, and he had put the time to good use in reading the Times. He gestured towards the morning’s obituaries.
“Our undertaker friends have a funeral this afternoon. They should be out for some hours yet,” he told me.
I grinned. “The perfect opportunity to do a little sleuthing.”
We made our way to the rooms of Messrs. Padgett and Pettifer. They operated out of a tall house in a respectable street in a fashionable quarter, the sort of establishment where everything would be done just so. A silent, sober porter opened the door, giving a lugubrious bow as he stepped back to let us in. I was conscious of the odor at once, a mingling of lilies and death and something else.
“Someone’s been at the camphor,” Stoker murmured.
I stifled a snort. He was quite right. Mourning clothes were often put aside with camphor sachets to be dragged out a
gain when circumstances demanded, leaving a telltale odor behind. Enormous vases of lilies stood in the corners of the hall, and every door was closed, each marked with a discreet placard indicating the purpose of the room. One was a showroom for coffins, another a display room for fabrics for mourning clothes. I could not see the rest, but it required little imagination to deduce that they must be put to similar use.
The porter bowed low, his expression one of studied dolor. “How may I be of service?”
“I am Sir Hugo Montgomerie,” Stoker lied smoothly. “This is Lady Montgomerie.”
I choked a little but passed it off as a momentary fit of weeping.
“As you can see, my wife is quite distressed, but she would insist upon coming,” Stoker said with suitable gravity. “We should like to consult with Mr. Padgett or Mr. Pettifer about arrangements for a bereavement we have suffered. It was quite sudden,” he added with a mournful downturn of his mouth.
The porter tutted regretfully. “I am sorry, Sir Hugo, my lady, but I am afraid both Mr. Padgett and Mr. Pettifer are conducting a funeral at Highgate at present. If you would care to call back later—”
“We will wait,” Stoker cut in.
The porter hesitated. “It might be some time,” he said. “I do think it would be best—”
Sensing the opportunity slipping from our grasp, I let out a wail. “Desmond! Oh, Desmond! Taken from us too soon,” I lamented.
Stoker’s expression was thunderous. “Are you happy, man? Look what you’ve done. Lady Montgomerie is distraught.”
I let my knees buckle a little, and Stoker’s arm came around me for support. “My wife needs to sit down and collect herself. In private,” he said sternly. The porter darted forward and opened a door.
“Of course, Sir Hugo, my lady. I am terribly sorry. Wait in here, please. I am certain Mr. Pettifer will not mind you using his private office.”
He ushered us through the door and indicated a pair of forbidding chairs upholstered in black silk. “Is there anything I can get for the lady?” he asked Stoker.
“Thank you,” Stoker replied with chilly hauteur. “I will attend to my wife.”
The porter bobbed his head. “Certainly. There is brandy upon the sideboard should her ladyship require revivifying. Please do not hesitate to ring should I be able to be of service.” He withdrew, closing the door firmly behind him.
Stoker arched a brow at me. “Desmond? Who in the seven devils is Desmond?”
“Our cat,” I said promptly. “Dashed under the wheels of a milk wagon.”
“Poor flat Desmond,” he said, sweeping off his hat as he glanced about the room. “Where shall we begin?”
“With the desk,” I replied. “There will be a record of the bodies they have prepared. You search the files and I will see if I can find a ledger.”
We set swiftly to work, occasionally pausing to make suitably mournful noises in case the porter were listening. I wailed from time to time, making certain to sniffle loudly as Stoker bent to picking the locks on the drawers of the desk. He made quick work of it, using a pair of my hairpins for the task. We searched carefully, sifting through notebooks and the leaves of the books on the shelf, moving methodically from drawer to drawer, but there was nothing. The only promising item was a wide ledger of black kid with a list of funerals they had undertaken, noted by date. I turned quickly to the month of Artemisia’s demise and found a single line—“‘Maud Eresby, spinster, aged 26 years. Prepared for burial and body dispatched to family home in Kent. Account settled in full by Sir Frederick Havelock,’” I read aloud. “Hell and blast, not a mention of her condition or even that she was murdered.”
“This is the business side of things,” Stoker pointed out as he searched the last drawer, empty except for a box of licorice. “Perhaps Mr. Pettifer is engaged in the accounts and front-of-house arrangements. There may be notes about embalming and such in the mortuary.”
I raised a speculative brow at him and he shook his head. “Absolutely not. It’s too much of a risk just now.” He opened the box of licorice and popped a piece into his mouth. Instantly, he gagged, spitting it into his handkerchief. He wiped his mouth and stuffed the handkerchief into his pocket.
“That tasted like Satan’s shoe leather,” he said, still gagging a little.
“Serves you right for being such a cowardy-cowardy custard,” I taunted lightly. To my surprise, the goad worked.
“Fine. We will search the mortuary, but if we are taken up for trespassing, I shall leave it to you to explain it all to Sir Hugo,” he warned.
“It is a bargain,” I promised. We crept on silent feet from the room, pausing a moment to make certain the porter was not lurking about. Stoker took the lead, grasping my hand tightly in his as we slipped down the corridor towards the back of the establishment. A single door at the end was marked with the word MORTUARY, and Stoker made directly for it, putting his hand to the knob but not turning it. I looked from the closed door to Stoker’s face. “Go on then,” I said flatly.
“You will not be distressed?” he asked.
“Will you?” I asked with a touch of asperity that he should doubt my mettle.
A derisive snort was his only reply, and he fell back, gesturing for me to lead the way. “Excelsior,” I muttered, invoking the motto of our favorite fictional detective. I pushed open the door to the mortuary, as resolute as any battlefield commander.
Instantly we were struck by the smell of carbolic—and something worse. Death has an odor of its own, sweet and heavy, and it hung in the air, enveloping us as soon as we entered. I reeled at the stench, but Stoker drew a deep breath of it. Death was his stock-in-trade, after all. There was nothing here that would frighten or disturb him.
We took a moment to get our bearings. The room was large, and along one wall ran a series of shelves neatly filled with jars of chemicals and various pieces of equipment, none of which I cared to examine further. There were assorted needles and bits of padding as well as pots of face paint and powder.
Stoker spoke in a low whisper. “Sometimes death does unlovely things. It is the undertaker’s task to mask them.”
My gaze went to the far side of the room where a series of marble tables stood in chilly splendor. The tiled floor below was fitted with drains, and I went to inspect in horrified fascination.
“What are these used for?” I demanded. Stoker explained the various steps of the embalming process and the necessity for drains to carry away the resulting effluvia.
“But where does it go?”
“Into the sewers,” he said cheerfully.
“That is repulsive,” I said, wrinkling up my nose.
“No worse than what is already there,” he pointed out. “And if you find that thought too repellent, I suggest you keep far away from our silent friend,” he said, nodding towards the shrouded figure lying on a table in the corner.
I went to it, pausing with my hand upon the sheet for only a moment before pulling it free. Under it lay the body of a young, naked man, the skin of his torso folded back as neatly as if it had been a shirtfront. I reeled away, and before Stoker could mock me, we heard footsteps. Without thinking, I grabbed him and vaulted onto the next table, dragging him on top of me. On his way down, he grasped the sheet and hauled it over us, shielding us from view. With any luck, whoever it was would simply complete their errand in the embalming room and leave quickly.
As we waited, tense and alert, it occurred to me that I might have arranged matters more efficiently by putting myself on top of Stoker. His weight was not inconsequential, and although he did his best not to crush me, the need to lie as flat as possible meant our bodies were thoroughly entangled in a position I knew neither of us could sustain for any length of time. His face was pressed against mine, cheek to cheek, and I felt the rasp of his whiskers. He had shaved only that morning, but his beard was heavy, and by afternoon th
e shadow of it always returned. His hired suit smelt of lavender and cedar—no doubt it had been laid away in these to deter moth—but his skin was his own peculiar mixture of male flesh and leather and linen and honey, always honey. One of his errant locks tickled my nose, and I breathed in sharply to keep from sneezing. His hands were where they had landed, one gripping my hip and one behind my head, cradling it against him. Mine were clasped against his shirtfront through which I could feel the slow, steady beating of his heart. My own was flitting like a hummingbird’s wings, but he was calm, and from the quick pulse of his stomach muscles clenched against mine, I knew he was stifling a laugh at the absurdity of our situation.
We clung together under the sheet, and I do not know what Stoker’s thoughts were, but I was listening intently for the footfalls as the person moved through the room. It was not the porter—his step had been heavier. This was a smaller, more diminutive footstep, almost tentative. It kept to the far side of the room, some distance from our makeshift hideaway, and I began to relax. Perhaps he would not come near us after all.
I flexed one foot against Stoker’s calf, easing a sudden cramp, and I felt him stiffen against me. He tightened his grip, causing me to gasp. In an instant, I heard a flurry of footsteps and then the sheet was whisked away. I looked over Stoker’s shoulder, blinking at the slender gentleman who gazed down at us, his expression one of staring horror.
“But—but—who on earth . . .” he began.
From behind him, a portly fellow appeared. He scrutinized us, then a broad smile broke over his features. “Why, Mr. Pettifer,” he said with terrible politeness, “do you not recognize our guests?” He fixed his rictus grin on us. “I am Mr. Padgett,” he said genially. “Welcome to our establishment, Miss Speedwell and Mr. Templeton-Vane.”
CHAPTER
20
Stoker showed no inclination to shift, so I prodded him with my finger. “Remove yourself from my person, Stoker. We are discovered.”
A Perilous Undertaking Page 22
