by Tessa Harris
Thomas paused for a moment. Either Lady Lydia had a cousin who was about forty years her junior, as none of his students was over twenty-five, or, more logically her ladyship was actually quite young herself.
“Show her in, if you please,” he instructed.
Lady Lydia was indeed young. He put her at no more than in her mid-twenties, although it was difficult to see her face properly as her head was swamped by a large bonnet, and her slight frame was concealed by a velvet cape. For some reason Thomas found himself feeling slightly awkward.
“I am honored that one of my students should think so highly of me,” he said, hating himself immediately for sounding so crass. “Please come in.” He gestured to the young woman.
The housekeeper was about to follow, but was put very firmly in her place by a stern look. “I am sure Lady Lydia would prefer her consultation in private,” he told her. Mistress Finesilver bit her thin lips and conceded defeat, flouncing out of the laboratory on the pretense of having to attend to one of her pies.
There was a difficult silence as Lady Lydia stepped inside and looked around the laboratory, letting her gaze settle on anything but Thomas. He, on the other hand, was fascinated by the young woman. He watched her expression change from one of curiosity to wide-eyed repulsion as she surveyed the flint glass jars that lined the walls. Chestnut curls peeped below her bonnet and long lashes fringed large eyes.
“May I take your cape?” asked Thomas. She looked at him as if he had just asked if he could remove her tonsils.
“I find it a little chilly in here,” she replied. It was the first time he had heard her speak and he thought her body might break with the effort.
Suddenly he remembered the stillborn. Of course she found it cold in the laboratory—any normal person would. He was accustomed to working with the windows open to keep down the temperature and to let out the stench of rotting flesh, but she was not. Like one of those exotic orchids Dr. Carruthers used to keep, she belonged in a glasshouse, in need of cosseting and cherishing. And what of the stillborn? What if she saw it? He backed up toward the dissecting table.
“I shall close the windows,” he assured her, surreptitiously pulling the sheet over the tiny child as he did so. But it was too late. Lady Lydia let out a gasp. Thomas was horrified. How could he have been so careless? Feeling embarrassed that he could so abuse a lady’s sensibilities he was rushing forward to apologize when he realized her horrified gaze was not directed at the babe, but at Franklin as he scurried about in the corner. Her gloved hand rose in fright as she pointed at the hapless rodent.
“A rat,” she shrieked.
Thomas was half relieved to hear that Franklin was responsible for her outburst. He quickly went over to him, picked him up by the scruff of the neck, and put him back in his cage, fastening the lock. “He always escapes,” he smiled, adding: “We keep him for experiments.”
She nodded, seemingly satisfied by this explanation, and Thomas had to remind himself of what he was doing before she had interrupted him.
“The windows. Yes,” he said purposefully, but Lady Lydia shook her head.
“No, please,” she interjected as he walked toward the casement. “The smell.”
From out of a small drawstring bag, she pulled a white linen handkerchief and held it to her nose. Thomas felt mortified. Not only was the air heavy with the smell of putrefied flesh, but he smelled, too, of formaldehyde. He looked down and immediately removed his large, stained apron. “Perhaps we should walk in the garden,” he suggested. Lady Lydia nodded her head. “I should like that,” she replied and she rose slowly, still clutching her handkerchief to her pale face.
Outside there was a small but pleasant courtyard. Underfoot Mistress Finesilver had planted sweet thyme that fragranced the air whenever it was stepped upon. Clumps of faded lavender, too, lined the wall, giving off the last of its pungent perfume. Thomas brushed against it deliberately so that its fragrance might permeate his own tainted clothes. He motioned toward a stone bench nearby, but the young woman declined.
“So, your cousin attends my lectures? Might I know him?”
“His name is Francis Crick. He is only a first-year student at the Company of Surgeons, but he commended you to me because of your work in a certain field.”
Thomas raised a curious eyebrow. “And what might that be?” He covered many aspects in his lectures, although these usually focused on a different part of the anatomy or a different pathological system each week.
The young woman looked at him earnestly. “It is the study of poisons,” she said.
It was a strange enquiry, he thought, to come from the lips of such a beautiful woman. “I know something of the subject, yes,” he acknowledged. He had lectured on the topic only a few weeks ago, but that was before he had begun his in-depth studies into the lymphatic system and its reaction to poisons.
“May I ask why it concerns you?” He did not mean to sound patronizing. Lady Lydia became agitated, shifting her weight, such as it was, from one foot to the other.
“You may have heard of my husband, Captain Michael Farrell.”
Thomas turned the name over in his head. He was not familiar with it. He looked at the young woman once more as she waited patiently for some glimmer of recognition. It did not come.
“Forgive me, I ...” Thomas began apologetically.
“The talk has not reached London, then,” she interrupted approvingly. “If it had you would know the name.”
Thomas was beginning to feel rather foolish and at a loss. Aware that she was traveling down a dead end, the young woman changed course.
“What if I were to tell you that I am the sister of the Earl Crick?”
It was a name that was vaguely known to Thomas. He recalled that one of his students had asked to be excused a lecture to attend the funeral of his cousin called Crick.
“Indeed, I know the name,” he acknowledged, although in reality he was still floundering in ignorance. Without lifting her head, the young woman said softly, as if she wanted no one to hear, “He is dead.” Thomas felt awkward.
“I am sorry,” he said politely, bowing his head slightly in a gesture of sympathy. But it was clearly not sympathy the young woman wanted. She looked directly at him and her voice was no longer soft.
“People are talking, Dr. Silkstone.” Thomas was taken by surprise. “They say my brother was murdered and that it was my husband who murdered him.” She was indignant. “I must know if he did, Dr. Silkstone.” Thomas could see that her hands were clenched below the folds of her cape.
“Why should they suspect your husband, my lady?” he found himself asking.
She looked up, fighting back the anger. “They say he poisoned Edward for his inheritance.”
“And you are asking me to prove that your husband is innocent,” said Thomas. He did not wish to prolong her agony.
She looked at him with large, frightened eyes that were glassy with tears and said, “I believe you are the only man in England who can discover the truth.”
Chapter 6
Oxford lay beneath them like a gleaming necklace of cream-colored knuckle bones threaded on a tendon of river that ran through a narrow valley below. The coach was now descending a steep, tree-lined hill and the young doctor peered out of the window like an eager child who had been promised a treat. He had heard so much about the university, even when he was a sophomore in Philadelphia, the so-called Athens of America. It was, according to his medical students, a hotbed of rebellion, of debauchery, of fine minds and loose morals. Instead of Plato and Aristotle, college talk was of port and allowances. The professors of the university rarely gave lectures and, as for examinations, most undergraduates had never even entered a library, let alone opened a book.
Thomas suspected a little bitterness and rivalry on their part, however, and he could not wait to find out if there was any foundation to these scurrilous accusations. When he had asked Dr. Carruthers about his students’ harsh opinion of the place, the old gentleman had tried
to dampen his interest. “Full of markets and cutpurses and muckworms who try to pass for scholars,” he had chuntered over a glass of brandy. He had paused for a moment, then chuckled. “But if they’re agin’ the Hanoverians, they can’t be all bad,” he mused. This enigmatic dismissal had left Thomas even more determined to one day visit the fabled city of academia, of John Milton and Jonathan Swift, and that day had now come about in a rather unexpected way.
As the coach bounced and lurched its way down the hill, Thomas turned toward the young woman who sat opposite him; the young woman who had come to him at his rooms in London in such desperation, pleading for his help, only the night before. He would never forget her large, doelike eyes as she begged him to help her solve the mystery of her brother’s death. Yet now, there she sat, not deigning to look at him for fear that one of the other passengers might suspect they were traveling together.
Joining Lady Lydia was her maid, Eliza, a full-bosomed wench, whose eyes strayed coquettishly now and again toward him. The doctor’s gaze, however, was firmly fixed on her ladyship and he watched her as she stared vacantly out of the window. In the cold light of day, those eyes looked smaller than the night before. It was Cicero who had called the eye the interpreter of the mind, mused Thomas. They may be silent today, he told himself, but her beauty was in no way diminished. He studied the carved helix of her ear and the delicate ovals of her nostrils. Her china white skin was completely flawless, except for a tiny exquisite mole to the left of her lips and yet he still found himself wondering what lay beneath this superficial epidermis. She must have been aware that he was looking at her, yet she deliberately ignored him.
“We must remain strangers on the coach,” she told him after he had agreed to travel to Oxfordshire with her. “It is imperative that people do not realize we are together.” There was an urgency in her voice that made him accept her instruction unquestioningly.
Now and again when she had lifted her gaze during the arduous journey from London, it had been to acknowledge some ribald comment made by the fat cleric who sat to her right. Thomas had made the mistake of revealing his profession before they were clear of Holborn and the well-built clergyman had insisted on divulging the grisly details of the lithotomy he had undergone, which had produced a stone as big as a plover’s egg. He enthused at great length about how the sizable stone had been excised by the surgeon in less than two minutes flat. Indeed, the description had been so graphic that the elderly woman who was on her way to visit her undergraduate son had almost passed out, and probably would have done so had Thomas not wafted some smelling salts under her nose.
The one saving grace of the journey had been the fact that the woman had been so grateful to Thomas for his care that she had shared the entire contents of a hamper originally destined for her son with her fellow passengers. Thomas had tucked into a pheasant leg, three oatcakes, and a flagon of cider on her insistence. It had helped pass the time and taken his mind off the unenviable task he might be asked to perform. He did not relish a postmortem on a corpse already in the advanced stages of decomposition. His desire for dissection was not as rapacious as some of his fellow anatomists. He did not seek out corpses with the appetite of a gourmet, keen to sample corporal delicacies. The examination of a cadaver in this advanced stage of decay would be an unpleasant means to a sought-after end, not an anatomical celebration.
The coach turned into Broad Street and came to a halt outside the White Horse. Lady Lydia had already gathered her belongings together. She had been reading what appeared to be letters for part of the journey and had folded them neatly, returning them to a small wallet she carried. As she rose from her seat, smoothing her skirts, Thomas looked at her deliberately, wondering if she might dart him a surreptitious glance. She did not and he watched, irritated, as the coachman helped her alight first.
“You are to wait at the White Horse. I will send a messenger presently,” she had instructed him the night before. He did not take kindly to being treated like a servant, but he told himself that Lady Lydia was in mourning and could therefore be excused.
On the newly laid pavement by the side of the road stood a liveried servant, and behind him a man with a pockmarked face. The servant bowed and took Lady Lydia’s gloved hand, escorting her to a waiting carriage. It stood a few yards away outside the Sheldonian Theatre, whose walls were adorned with the busts of famous philosophers. Socrates and Aristotle looked down upon the bustling street below, like Greek gods watching over mere mortals. A carrot-haired boy of no more than ten years of age followed behind, struggling with his mistress’s luggage.
Thomas had kept his precious instrument bag with him at his feet throughout the journey. The driver handed him the only other bag he possessed, containing an apron and a change of clothes, and he began to make his way toward the White Horse, just as Lady Lydia’s carriage moved off. He could see the brim of her hat and the curve of her nose through the window and, just as he had given up all hope, she turned, as if she knew he had been watching her, and fixed him in her eye. There was no smile, no nod, no gesture of recognition; just a silent, motionless look. It was enough and Thomas was made to feel he was the most important man in the whole of Oxford.
He did not know how long he would have to wait at the inn. Lady Lydia had been very vague about her intentions. It may, she said, be only two or three hours. On the other hand he might have to wait overnight before he was sent word of her plans. She had gone on ahead to Boughton Hall, about six miles north of the city, and would consult with her husband before deciding whether or not she required Thomas’s services.
The young doctor made his way inside the inn, carefully ducking under the low lintel at the entrance. After such a tedious journey, Thomas thought himself entitled to a little relaxation. The inn was cramped, with several small rooms leading off each other, like a rabbit warren. The air was thick with pipe smoke and the sickly sour smell of beer.
“A tankard of your best ale,” Thomas asked the ruddy-faced landlord. There was a moment’s pause as the man processed Thomas’s demeanor and his accent in particular. Detecting this new patron was from the Colonies, the innkeeper raised a disapproving eyebrow and the frothing tankard was duly dispatched, without any pleasantries, on the bar together with a few farthings in change.
Three other men who sat at a nearby table also turned to look at this traitor in their midst. Thomas was aware of an undercurrent of hostility, as their eyes bored into him with a steady pressure, but he had become used to it, as if such regular contempt had anesthetized his senses. It no longer bothered him and he simply took his ale and sat down at a small table by the window.
A sickly fire flickered in the inglenook and despite the fact that the inn was by no means empty, Thomas felt oddly alone. He took out his purse and was about to drop in his change when he saw a scrap of paper. He suddenly remembered Dr. Carruthers had slipped it in there the night before when he had told him he would be visiting Oxford for a day or two. “Might be worth your while looking this chap up,” the old gentleman said. Despite not being able to see, he had scrawled a name on the paper in a spidery hand and pressed it into Thomas’s pocket. “ ’Course he could be dead by now. Always ill, but he was a good anatomist in his day,” the old doctor had chuckled.
Thomas squinted as he tried to read the almost illegible hand. After a few moments of holding the parchment up to the light from the window he was able to decipher it: “Professor Hans Hascher, Christ Church Anatomy School.” He took a large gulp of his ale. It was weak and tasted of watered-down vinegar. He did not like this place and he had no reason to stay here, at least not for the next few hours anyway, he told himself. He memorized the name and address, pushed the half-empty tankard to one side, and stood up. The three heads turned once more and watched him walk toward the door. As Thomas reached the threshold he heard someone utter, “Bloody New Worlder.” He paused to register the insult, but chose to ignore it, then walked out into the watery light of an October day.
Cha
pter 7
Jacob Lovelock carried the coal scuttle across to the kitchen fire as his wife, Hannah, struggled with sticks and tapers at the grate. Wiping his forehead with a sooty hand, he left coal dust in the pockmarks that pitted his face, turning some of them into small black volcanic craters.
“I don’t know as how you could,” scolded Mistress Claddingbowl, the cook. Hannah had allowed the fire to go out and now there was no hot water for Captain Farrell’s morning tea, let alone his toilet. The flustered maid was trying desperately to rekindle the flames, blowing frantically when a spark caught hold of a stick, but her task was made all the more difficult because the wood had been allowed to get damp.
“So, you’ve let the fire go out.” The voice of Rafferty, the captain’s manservant, sent a shudder down Hannah’s spine. Mr. Rafferty—no one knew his first name—had served with Captain Farrell in India for ten years. When a back injury forced him to leave the army, the captain eagerly employed him as his valet. He had an air of quiet authority about him. He never raised his voice to the other servants, although his sharp tongue could sting as much as any birch. Hannah stared at the floor as Rafferty approached. “ ’Tis a good job the master does not have need of it yet,” he told her, softening his tone a little. “He still sleeps.”
Jacob shrugged his broad shoulders. “ ’Tis a wonder he can sleep at all,” he muttered, shoveling coals onto the fire.
Rafferty’s back suddenly stiffened. “What was that?” The smirk suddenly disappeared from Jacob’s face and he stood upright.
“I said the master needs his sleep and all, Mr. Rafferty, sir.”
The valet narrowed his eyes. “The master’s going through a bad time. We should all support him,” he growled in his low Irish brogue. Tugging indignantly at his waistcoat, he turned and walked toward the pantry.
Jacob waited until the manservant was out of earshot. “Bad time? He seemed right enough to me yesterday,” he said as he poked the coals fiercely.
