The Resurrection Fireplace

by Hiroko Minagawa

  “Not elderly, but not a young man either. In his forties, perhaps.”

  Moore asked them to measure the body’s height and record any distinguishing features.

  “When was he discovered? And by whom?” asked Sir John.

  For several moments, there was silence.

  “We all found him together—quite unexpectedly,” Edward said finally. “After Miss Moore and her assistant departed, we brought the boy’s body into the dissection room, where this man was lying face-up on one of the tables.”

  “When was the last time beforehand that you confirmed that nothing was on any of the dissecting tables?”

  “I cannot recall exactly when it was. Owing to the summer holiday, this room has not been used for some time.”

  At Sir John’s request, Moore described the room in detail: its dimensions, the number and position of the tables, the cabinets and other furnishings.

  “The room has four entrances in all,” she said. “Two lead to the specimen room, and two to the lecture hall. None are locked.”

  “Outsiders are free to come and go, then? That hardly sounds safe.”

  “We do have a doorkeeper,” said Clarence.

  The magistrate changed the subject. “Professor Barton, I am informed that with the passage of time the blood gathers at the lowest part of a corpse, causing bruises to appear on the skin. Does this body exhibit such bruising?”

  With the help of his pupils, Barton turned the cadaver over and examined it. “Putrefaction has advanced too far to say,” he reported, returning the body to its original position.

  “The man may have been killed elsewhere, then, and brought here afterwards.”

  “All manner of things are possible,” said Barton. “To ascertain the truth, a ready supply of comparative material is necessary.”

  “When do you estimate the man died?”

  “That too cannot be known without inspecting more cadavers. We need to closely observe the changes that occur after death and analyse the outcome statistically. To do so, cadavers are required. Even the hangings at Tyburn can result in a tug-of-war.” As his fervour rose, perspiration beaded on his forehead, making him look like a potato in the rain. “Even I, who have seen more dead bodies than most, have not seen enough to answer your question precisely. I hope to provide my students with an accurate textbook. The old theories abided by since the Middle Ages are unsound, every one. ‘Illness arises from an imbalance of the humours.’ This explains everything, and so-called medicine is nothing but blood-letting and enemas. Yet to anyone who makes a true study of the human body, it is at once clear that these prized notions are utterly spurious.”

  “I understand your position well, Professor. Nevertheless, I hope you will agree to allow an autopsy on these additional two cadavers to be performed by another. Both were discovered in a highly unnatural condition, and dispelling the suspicion that you or your pupils were involved will be difficult. Indeed, if you were to continue to examine them yourselves, some might suspect that you did so in order to eliminate evidence. You have no objection to my turning the matter over to a trusted physician, I presume?”

  “I regret the loss of any opportunity for my pupils to perform a dissection, but I suppose I have no choice.”

  “Anne, have Abbott procure two coffins and a carriage. Take the bodies to Dr. Osborne and ask him to carry out autopsies on them in my name. Then muster some officers and have them search this building for a murder weapon… . Professor Barton, is there anywhere we might go to escape this smell?”

  “You are welcome to use my study.”

  Barton led the way to the second floor, with Moore helping Sir John on the stairs. The others followed them up, including Nigel, who had finished his illustration.

  Shown into Barton’s study, the magistrate wrinkled his nose. “The smell of death has been replaced by the smell of alcohol, it seems.”

  “There are specimens in glass jars on the shelves,” his assistant told him.

  At this point, Nelly arrived with some fragrant black tea.

  “Our problems have begun to multiply,” Sir John announced. “Anne, a summary, if you please.”

  “Certainly… . Arsenic was present in Miss Roughhead’s blood. Two other corpses were found: one a boy who appears to be between fourteen and sixteen. All four of his limbs were severed at the joint, but the cause of death is unclear. The other belonged to a man estimated to have been in his forties. There is evidence that he was strangled.

  “According to Mr. Barton and his pupils, they wrapped the body of Miss Roughhead in a cloth and hid it in the fireplace when Hales and Bray arrived during the dissection. Once the two men left, the bundle was retrieved just before Abbott and I appeared. As you know, Sir John, our visit was in response to some anonymous information. On opening the bundle, they discovered the boy’s body inside instead of Miss Roughhead’s.

  “Mr. Barton and his pupils claim to know nothing of why this should have transpired. No one knows who the boy is, or why he has a blue fluid—which appears to be ink—smeared on his chest.

  “When they took the boy’s body to the other dissection room, they discovered the naked corpse of a man with a disfigured face lying on one of the tables. His identity is unknown, as is the time of his murder. No weapon has been found, but once our officers arrive, we shall begin a search of the premises.

  “That is all that we have established at present. The truth of what these gentlemen have told us has yet to be confirmed.”

  Sir John sighed. “I suppose we must steel ourselves for another visit to that foul-smelling room,” he said. “The fireplace in which Miss Roughhead’s body changed places with the boy’s must be inspected. An unpleasant task indeed.”

  Barton sighed as deeply as the magistrate had. “Clarence, explain the construction of the fireplace to Sir John.”

  “Is it necessary?”

  “We cannot make a chimney-sweep of him, and he would soon discover the truth in any case.”

  “The fireplace is of the sort designed by Prince Rupert,” Clarence began.

  The magistrate understood the implications of this at once, depriving the chatterbox of a chance to chatter.

  “We concealed the bundle containing Miss Roughhead at the base of the flue, with a rope attached,” Clarence continued, hoping to keep at least the winch secret. The magistrate might grasp the importance of dissection and anatomical studies, but the letter of the law and the feelings of London’s citizens would not change so readily. It would be necessary for some time yet to obtain subjects by illegal means.

  Barton, for his part, held his tongue so as not to hamper his pupil’s circumspection.

  “And when you pulled the bundle out, its contents had changed.”

  “Yes. Once your officers had left, we searched the flue again, to find another bundle—Miss Roughhead.”

  “I wonder,” said Sir John, “if you would swear to that story in court, one hand on the Holy Bible? If it were untrue, you would be charged with perjury. It is a grave crime, punishable by transportation to the colonies.”

  Clarence looked about him evasively.

  “It was just as he says,” Edward said firmly. “I was the one who went in to the bottom of the flue. If there must be a trial, I will give sworn testimony.”

  Sir John rose wearily to his feet. “I believe we should examine that fireplace after all,” he said.

  Clarence ran ahead to raise the fire door and hide the hook before the others came in.

  Miss Moore crawled into the fireplace. When she emerged shortly afterwards, her face was black as coal.

  “There is hot water in the kitchen,” Clarence told her. “Soot is difficult to get off.”

  “Thank you,” she said. Her brown-green eyes stood out against her blackened skin.

  A carriage carrying two empty coffins drew up at the
Professor’s residence, and a team of five constables came running afterwards. When the carriage departed with the cadavers, Abbott went with them while Moore remained behind with Sir John.

  “Regarding the identity of those two bodies, your claim to know nothing of the matter remains unchanged, I take it?” the latter asked.

  “I know nothing of them at all,” said Barton, clearly troubled.

  “And you, Clarence Spooner?”

  “Likewise, sir.”

  “Portly Benjamin Beamis, how is it with you?”

  “I know nothing, either.”

  “Remember as you answer that, while I am blind, my hearing is acute. I can recognize from the voice alone when someone is telling the truth and when they are lying. Miss Moore’s powers of observation are also sharp, and she sees on my behalf. Now, Albert Wood, what say you?”

  “I know nothing about them.”

  “Edward Turner.”

  “Yes?”

  “Do you know anything about the remains of the older man?”

  “I do not.”

  “Do you know anything about the mutilated boy?”

  “I do not.”

  When Sir John put the same two questions to Nigel, he received the same answers—but it did not take the magistrate’s heightened sense of hearing to detect the quiver in his voice when answering about the boy.

  Barton made a plea for tolerance, saying that Edward and Nigel were both young, but to the science of anatomy invaluable.

  “Yet the questions are hardly intolerant,” Moore remarked.

  “Let me make a proposal,” said Barton. “I shall ask my pupils about the matter again later. I believe they will be more forthcoming to me than to you. What I hear from them I shall then pass on. I can state with certainty that neither of these two would ever be involved in anything untoward. Please leave the questioning in my hands. Discovering how Miss Roughhead came to take arsenic and who the faceless man is will surely keep you occupied enough.”

  “I accept your suggestion. And I expect you to return Miss Roughhead’s body to her family once you have determined whether she was poisoned internally.”

  “With your permission, I shall remove the foetus and make a specimen of it. We will then prepare her against decay, sew her up, and send her back.”

  Clarence rounded this off by saying, “From now on, perhaps you could leave the autopsies to us. Your Bow Street Runners are famous for the pursuit and arrest of criminals—let us Bartonites be those who determine the cause of death. Particularly when there is any suspicion that arsenic is involved, Edward’s apparatus will prove its worth.”

  “Arsenic,” muttered Sir John. “Anyone who wanted to obtain it could do so.”

  The five constables now entered the room and announced that they had found nothing that appeared to be a murder weapon.

  “Mind you,” added one, “it could have been thrown into the Thames. You’d never find it then.”

  After their visitors had all left, Nigel passed several folded pages of drawings to his teacher.

  “So you didn’t throw them away!” Barton cried, delighted.

  “Abbott found them after I hid them in the privy, but he seems to have decided not to pass them to Miss Moore. Before going to fetch a carriage, he returned them to me in private.”

  “A hard heart melted by your artistry!” said Barton. “Come, let us prepare the foetus. Edward, assist us. The rest of you, open Miss Roughhead’s alimentary tract, check for traces of arsenic, record the results, and then preserve her against putrefaction and sew her back together.”

  Nelly poked her head in from the kitchen to announce that luncheon was ready.

  “Later,” said Barton. “We must finish this first.”

  Glancing at what his hands were doing, she made a hurried sign of the cross.

  “The meat will go cold.”

  “Let it.”

  Lunch was the only meal Barton provided for his pupils. Sometimes the meal included some imported delicacy courtesy of Al’s father, but Nelly had grown up in a remote Irish village and her culinary repertoire was limited.

  It was almost two hours before Barton and his pupils finished their labours and sat down around the table.

  “I am famished,” said Ben. “What time is it, Edward?”

  Edward began to reach into his pocket, then stopped and shook his head. “It’s at the pawnbroker’s,” he muttered. He raised one finger to his lips, not wanting their teacher to know that he had pawned it.

  Pocket-watches were expensive, and among the pupils only Edward and Al owned one. Al was from a wealthy family, but not Edward—he was an orphan. Barton had generously bought him a watch as a reward for making the arsenic testing apparatus. The timepiece was old, but it had not been cheap.

  “Almost two o’clock,” reported Al, having fished his own watch out of his waistcoat pocket.

  “Two? No wonder I am so hungry,” said Ben.

  The lamb on their plates was cold and hard. As usual, Nelly had given Edward a large piece. Her devotion to him was the sole thing keeping her in service in this “house of the Devil,” as she put it, whose “sinful business” made her constantly cross herself. It was not customary in England for the cook to prepare different meals for master and staff: the former simply received the largest portion of meat or fish, and the latter whatever was left. Plates were big, and servings too. Beggars often called at the kitchen doors of wealthy households hoping for leftovers. Unlike his brother Robert, Barton was by no means wealthy, but he did well enough to supply the occasional beggar with scraps.

  Because Al’s father gave them a discount, there was plenty of claret. Cold and tough as the meat may have been, the pupils stuffed it in their mouths and washed it down with the deep red wine.

  Conversation was subdued. Clarence attempted to lighten the mood with an aphorism: “Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy!”

  “… As Samuel Johnson said,” Edward added.

  Edward’s interjection gave Ben the opportunity to interrogate him. “Why, incidentally, did you lie to the magistrate about the faceless man?” he asked. “You knew he was found at the bottom of the fireplace. He was only on the dissecting table after we carried him there.”

  “The number of people who know how our fireplace is built is very small,” Edward said. “Not even the householder knows.”

  “But then… Do you mean it might have been one of us who killed that man, smashed his face, and threw him down the flue?”

  “If we had told Sir John the truth about where he was found, we would have been the first to fall under suspicion. And while we know very well that Professor Barton was not aware of the fireplace’s inner structure, the magistrate would doubtless suspect him too. With the man found on a dissecting table instead, Sir John will begin by trying to identify him and search for someone with a motive for doing it. An investigation begun broadly, without prejudice, will include suspects other than ourselves. I no more believe that whoever committed the deed is among us than you do. I simply thought it best not to prejudice the magistrate.”

  “Still, to lie to him… I could not do it,” Ben said with obvious concern. “My voice was all he needed to see through me—or, I should say, hear through me? Edward, he may have detected your falsehood as well. What will you do if he demands to know why you lied? Your explanation might satisfy us, but will it satisfy him—not to mention his assistant?”

  “And what about that boy?” asked Clarence. “You said that it was you and Nigel who hung him from the winch hook, and that you would tell Professor Barton who he was. Can you tell us now?”

  Nigel got to his feet. Turning away from them, he ran upstairs. Edward made to follow, but Barton called him back.

  “Edward, let us speak in private,” he said. “Al, Ben, Clarence, y
our work for the day is over. You are dismissed. Do not speak of today’s events to your families, or anyone else.”

  “Not a word, we swear.” Clarence spoke for all of them. “But, Professor, in due course we would be glad for the full story from you.”

  “All right, all right. Today, you may go.”

  They rose from the table. Al gave Edward a meaningful look and the two of them went to a corner to whisper together briefly.

  “What is it?” Barton called to them.

  “Oh—nothing,” stammered Al. “Good day, Professor. Until tomorrow.”

  When the others had left, Barton invited Edward to his study upstairs. As they passed the room Edward shared with Nigel, the Professor made as if to knock on the door, but Edward stopped him, urging him not to disturb his friend.

  Inside the study, Barton took a bottle of claret from the shelf. He poured some into a pewter cup for Edward, then poured another for himself.

  “Edward, whatever is to come, I am with you,” he told him. He drained his cup. “Even if you have been party to murder. Even if you have committed murder yourself. Your talent outweighs any crime. Now, tell me: what happened?”

  “I have done nothing to be ashamed of before God.” Edward left his cup untouched.

  “Then I insist even more firmly, tell me. Tell me everything. What is the secret you and Nigel share? You may be able to keep it, but not him. And he is another I cannot bear the thought of losing.”

  “What are your thoughts on the act of suicide, Professor?” Edward asked abruptly.

  Barton looked discomfited. “I am neither theologian nor philosopher,” he replied. “In the unlikely event that you died by your own hand, I know I would feel a great void in me. The same applies to Nigel. My grief would be heartfelt. I would blame myself, asking if I could not have done something to prevent it.”

  “Suppose that Nigel injured his right hand and could no longer do his illustrations. Would you dismiss him?”

  Barton gave the question some thought. “I am not sure,” he answered finally. “I know what my answer should be. ‘Whatever may befall him, he matters to me.’ Replying in this way would satisfy most people. But without being placed in that situation, I cannot say how I would respond. Whether my feelings for him would wax with pity—or the opposite.”