Clifton sniffed, “Of course not. But I live on the farm next door and I’ve heard no such reports. All of our animals are accounted for.”
“Perhaps they did not think the news fit for such young, delicate ears.”
“We’re nearly thirteen,” Monty said.
“Is that right? Hmm. Well, that seems far too young to go off into the woods at night. I think I’ll just drink this all by myself and have a look then.”
Just as Will lifted the bottle to his mouth and was about to drink, Monty asked, “Is that wine?”
“No, no, no, silly boy,” Will said. “It is something much different. Here, smell it.” Will held it under both their noses. “There is an ancient text in India called the Vedas, written before Britain existed. Those texts describe a god that disguised itself as a plant, grown in the mountains that Indra and Agni ground into powder and drank. It is said that any mortal who drinks it is flung into divinity.”
“Is that it?” Monty whispered, staring at the bottle.
Will drank deeply from it, setting it back on the counter, half-empty. “There is only one way to find out,” he said, wiping his mouth. “Off I go, boys. I will see this monster for myself.”
Will opened the back door and vanished into the darkness. Clifton and Monty looked at one another silently, then down at the bottle.
~ * * * ~
The boys stared in wonder at the iridescent trails of modulating light left by the lightning-bugs, connecting them all to one another. Clifton laughed, putting his hand out to grab one of the glowing threads and held his hand up, seeing pure light dripping from his fingers.
Monty realized it was just a spider’s web clinging to Clifton’s hand but as he tried to pull it away, the web stuck to him as well. Monty found himself bound to Clifton, unable to pull away.
“How strange that I never recognized the song that each cricket was singing. Do you hear them Monty? So many different voices.”
Monty nodded, staring up at the tree tops which seemed only a few feet away from the surfaces of the stars. “I am going to climb them,” Monty said. “I’ll never return.”
“Oh don’t be silly,” Clifton laughed. Suddenly, he went silent. “Did you hear that?”
“Stop trying to scare me.”
“Be silent,” Clifton said. “I hear something.”
A horrible scream rang out in the woods. Both boys dropped to the ground instantly. The voice was like a terrified child or woman. “What the hell was that?” Monty whispered. His hands were shaking uncontrollably, and he felt like he might vomit. The drink had been bitter, tasting of bark and smelling like ivy, scratching his throat as he swallowed. His eyes burned, and he was sweating as if it were a summer day.
“Let’s go back,” Clifton said, pulling on his shoulder.
“I hear something again.” Monty lifted his head in the air, cocking his ear toward the darkness. Branches were creaking and cracking, and something large was being dragged through the woods. “Over there.”
Both of the boys bent low, crouching as they approached. Ahead in a cluster of trees, hidden in the shadows, a small calf slammed down onto the leaves and dirt of the wood’s floor.
The creature came out of the shadows hunched over, its claws sweeping over the calf. It struggled, as if trying to rise, but the beast struck it back down to the ground with a heavy blow. The calf kicked wildly, but the beast grabbed it by one of its legs and pinned it down, leaning over the bleating animal and ripping it open with one long shining claw. Blood sprayed into the cold air.
Clifton moaned in terror, and Monty felt the back of his leg go warm and wet against him. The beast grabbed the calf by the scruff of its neck, yanking it backwards and sinking its claw into the exposed pale throat.
“Christ, it’s Will,” Clifton groaned. “It’s your brother. He’s become a demon! Run, Monty, or the devil will claim us too!” He stumbled out of the thicket and darted through the darkness.
Monty could not move. The beast looked down at him with bright red glowing eyes, and beckoned, offering him the dripping meat of the calf. “Will?” Monty whispered.
The beast’s height and shape changed as it stepped into the moonlight, taking its twisted, grinning face. “Come, Monty. Share in the kill. Join me.”
“No,” Monty gasped, backing away. “No, I can’t! Clifton, wait!”
He broke into a sprint, tearing blindly through the thick, thorny brush. By the time he found Clifton, both were wheezing and bloodied from branches whipping them as they escaped. Neither of them spoke, listening to the silence of the woods save for the birds and crickets. “How far did we run?” Clifton huffed.
“I do not know,” Monty said, clutching his side. “Hopefully far enough.”
“You have a branch stuck in your hair.” Clifton laid his hand on Monty’s shoulder and unwound the branch from his hair. “Try not to move while I pull it out. There.”
“You have thorns stuck in your shirt.” Monty pulled Clifton’s shirt tight and plucking the thorns out. The two of them were close enough for Monty to feel Clifton’s breath on his neck.
Monty pulled him close and the two of them sank down together into the moss, entangling themselves beneath the bare, pale moon.
~ * * * ~
William left trays for Monty with all of the organs separated and Monty would carry the tray into the specimen laboratory to measure, weigh them, place them in a jar, then label and seal.
“Monty? Bring us a set of instruments,” William said.
Monty leaned out the door, “The ones you have are clean, father.”
William looked up at the boy, one eyebrow cocked. Monty nodded and collected a tray of tools. He selected a pair of sturdy forceps, several clamps, a variety of bone handled saws and blades, tweezers, several sutures. He carried the tray out, expecting to see a collection of organs and a cadaver on the operating table with a sheet covering its open body, as William always made sure to do before Monty had to enter the room.
Instead, William was seated, rubbing his chest. He was sweating heavily and breathing as if he could not fill his lungs. William waived for Monty to put the tray down. A naked woman lied on the table, untouched. Monty set down the tray and went to William’s side. “What is it? Are you all right?”
“Just a damned tightening in my chest,” William said, cringing. “No bother. I’ve been working too hard lately, pushing myself too much. This is the last one. I may-” William had to stop talking, needing to take several breaths before continuing. “I may require your assistance, Monty.”
Monty looked at the woman and swallowed. Her milk white skin was marbled with blue veins that ran the length of her body. Her sagging breasts peaked with indented nipples and areolas the size of Monty’s palm, hanging sideways against her inner arms. He had never seen a completely naked woman before. It occurred to him that several hours ago, this woman had been living and breathing. Hours ago she might have died of shock to think herself naked and exposed in this manner under his astounded eye.
Her belly was riddled with wrinkled skin. The indentations from the waist of her skirt were etched in her flesh eternally by rigor mortis. Monty stared at the furry black bush of hair between her legs. “What do you need me to do?”
“Help me to my feet,” William said. Together, they got William up from his seat and over to the table. “First, we must ascertain that she is dead.” Monty laughed sharply. “This is of the utmost seriousness, Monty. You cannot imagine how many people are mistakenly thought dead. I’ve heard horror stories of careless doctors who do not take the time to conduct the tests. Fetch me a scarificator and three cupping glasses.”
Monty brought William’s tools from the cupboard. The scarificator was an older model, made of brass with several wicked blades that shot through the edge at the push of a button. William took the device and held it to the woman’s bicep, pressing the button and shooting the blades into her flesh. “Write this down, Monty. No blood flow observed on upper limb.” He
placed the scarificator on the inside of the woman’s thigh and pressed the button. When he moved it, Monty could see a dozen slashes in her flesh, but no blood leaking through. Monty documented that as well.
William struck a match and held it inside each of the cupping glasses, placing them onto the woman’s belly, breast, and thigh. The skin inside the glass did not rise or change color. “No epidermal response to cupping glasses,” William said. “Hand me a needle.” William took the ten-inch needle and pierced the sole of the woman’s left foot, driving it in above her heel until the tip poked under the skin on the arch of her foot. “No response to that either. I think it is conclusive that she is dead. We may begin.”
At William’s instruction, Monty did a quick sketch of the woman’s body, noting the position of her arms and legs, which had been in the same position as when they arrived at the office. Monty stared in wonder as his father took a knife and slit her forehead from ear to ear, pulling her scalp free with a firm tug on her hair. “Next, we expose the skull and check for injuries.”
The skull’s crown was pearl white, and at the center was a large circular indentation, chipping the bones around it outward in a spider web. “Here we are. Make a drawing of this, please,” William instructed.
Monty quickly sketched the wound while William read through the paperwork underneath the woman’s clothes. “Her husband reported that she fell down the stairs after drinking too much brandy. I think that wound looks more like a hammer’s blow. I believe it is safe to say that the police will want to speak to this man at length. Give me the saw.” William sawed across the scalp line, scattering white bone dust on his clothes and the floor. He went around her entire head with the saw, then twisted and uncapped the woman, revealing her brain. “Get me a bucket,” William said. Monty held the bucket underneath the skull as blood and clumps of brain matter leaked into it. William severed the connective nerves of the wet gray mass inspected it between his thumbs over top of the bucket. “Here it is,” he grinned, spreading the gelatinous surface of the brain flat with his thumbs. “Do you see the clotted blood where the skull was broken?”
Monty nodded. William told him to fetch a tray for the brain, which was set on the table.
“Help me flip her over,” William said. Monty grabbed the woman beneath her cold arms and pulled her toward him, feeling her breasts squash against his chest. “Let her down on her chest.” He cut her open down the length of her spine, along either side, exposing the knotted bones of her spinal cord. He inspected each length of the spine, and grunted with satisfaction. “Now flip her back over. Hand me the larger knife.” William’s hand shook as he wrapped his fingers around the bone handle. “This is why we always sharpen our knives at the end of business on Friday, Monty. We never know which one we will need them that following Monday. Here we are. Help me, I cannot seem to steady my hand.”
“Allow me, father,” Monty said, putting his hand over William’s. With his son steadying him, William made the cuts and reflected the skin flaps under her jaw. “Now we must plunge the knife in and under the symphysis of the jaw.”
“Where is that?”
“Where the two mandibular bones meet, right at the center of the jaw directly below her two lower front teeth,” William replied. Monty pointed the knife into the woman’s gullet as William instructed. He looked down at her calm face, with the large knife’s handle sticking out from her chin. “Reach in and grab her tongue, and pull it down and through that opening in her throat.”
Monty looked down at the woman’s severed skull, splayed front, and tongue poking out of the opening in her throat and exhaled deeply. “Are you all right, son?”
“I am fine. How are you feeling?”
“Better. Take your knife and divide her palate. Can you identify the pharynx, larynx and trachea? Good. Remove them one by one and place them on the tray. Now remove her esophagus. As you examine each organ, do you see any foreign objects in them?”
Monty inspected them carefully and said no. William then instructed Monty on slitting the bronchi and removing it, then cutting the lungs into sections. Once finished, William bent over and wiped his brow. “Just give me a moment, son. I need to collect myself before we perform the abdominal incision.”
Monty caught a whiff of scent from the opening at the woman’s throat. For a moment, he was back in the garden at his parent’s house, staring at Georgiana. This was not the same, but it was close enough.
Monty turned away from his father, adjusting himself.
“I need to rest for a moment.” William collapsed into a chair near the operating table. “I will be ready momentarily, my boy.”
“May I continue? I have studied this aspect of the operation extensively, father.”
William coughed fitfully and nodded. “Thank you,” Monty said through gritted teeth, now pressing against the table so hard that he was crushing himself against its metal edges. His grip on the knife’s handle was slick, and he had to readjust several times to make sure he held it tightly enough. He touched the blade to the woman’s flesh and felt his pulse in his fingers.
“Do it slowly, do not make a mess of it.”
“Yes, sir,” Monty said. Sweat was dripping from his brow. Monty pushed again, this time with the knife, and it slid inside the woman’s gut, little by little, inch by inch.
“Good,” William said. “Now draw it downwards and open her up.”
He sank into her flesh, grinding the blade against her rib cartilage and sliding it in and out to saw away the ligaments below. He cut down toward the dark curly thatch of hair between her legs and the red and pink organs within her that burst through the opening, onto Monty who squeezed his thighs together and grunted, feeling a warm wetness trickling down his thigh.
FOUR
Monty soon became so proficient at performing autopsies that William spent his days sitting in the specimen laboratory labeling jars while Monty provided him with trays of organs. Often, they would take the last train home, arriving late in the evening.
One night, as their cab rolled toward the front of their home they heard a door bang shut and saw the shadow of a man leap from the rear steps behind the house, and race into the darkness. Monty gasped in shock as the man turned for a moment into the light of the carriage’s lanterns. “Stop the cab!” William shouted. He jumped to the road, ordering Monty to go check on Ann while he gave chase.
“You want me to come with you, young sir?” the cab driver asked.
“No, that is not necessary. My father is ill. Please pull the car to the back in the turnaround.” Monty watched the man race into the woods. He walked slowly toward the front door and opened it just as a glass bottle shattered over his head. She stood naked in the living room, fists balled.
“Mother?” Monty said. “What happened to you?“
“Why are you here!” she screamed. “Why do you always have to ruin my life?” She collapsed to the ground, shrieking.
“My God, did that man do this to you?” Monty said, grabbing a blanket from the sofa and throwing it around her.
“Bring him back!” she screamed. “He wants to be with me! Why are you here?”
Understanding dawned on him, and Monty’s face twisted in rage. “How could you?”
Ann raced forward, beating Monty with her fists across his chest, “I know about you and that farm boy! Everyone knows! Filth! Sinners!”
Monty seized Ann by the throat, “Be silent, whore.” He heard William’s voice behind the house, approaching the back stars.
“I wish you were all dead!” Ann hissed back. “Your father knows what I do and does not even have the courage to protest.”
Monty slammed his forehead into her face, cracking the bone over her eye. Blood spurted from the wound, and Ann cried out. Monty punched her, opening up her lip. Ann fell backwards, reeling and whimpering. Monty listened for a moment to the voices behind the house, assessing how far away they were and how much time he had. He slapped and pinched her neck and shoulders, ha
rd enough to leave welts and bruises.
He kicked her several times, until Ann whimpered and lifted her legs to her chest to protect herself, sobbing. He knew what needed to be done. Monty headed for the kitchen, eyeing the counters for the sharpest knife he could find.
“Monty? Where are you?” his father called, running to the door. He gasped at Ann’s sprawled body.
“I found her like this,” Monty said, turning from the kitchen. “I think she was violated! Oh God!” Monty said, throwing his face into his hands.
William and Monty did not leave Dorset for many weeks after that. William cared for Ann, unwilling to leave her side. He lamented being so far away and leaving her vulnerable. Ann seemed calm in those days. She did not leave her bed, but also did not shriek or curse at them. When Monty passed her room, he saw William on a bench by her bed, reading softly to her. Monty grimaced at the affection his father displayed on her, but could not bring himself to tell William the truth about his whoring wife.
He took long, undisturbed walks in the fields, searching for signs of the beast he and Clifton had seen. There were none. He checked the place where they’d seen the calf, but that too was gone. Monty continued through the woods, coming to the edge of the farm and saw a group of men working in the field. Clifton was not among them. They looked at him as he came out from between the trees, stepping into the amber stalks of wheat. He could see that they were talking to one another while looking at him.
Monty walked up to the farmhand’s house and knocked on the door. A young woman answered. “May I help you?” she asked.
“Is Clifton here?” Monty said.
She stared at him for a moment. “Are you Montague Druitt?”
Monty’s eyebrows raised, “Yes, I am. How did you—”
The door slammed in Monty’s face. He could hear words spoken quickly within. Someone was coming to the door. Finally, Clifton opened it and smiled. His teeth were very white and very straight when he smiled, Monty thought, smiling back. “Hello Monty.” The men in the field were now all staring at him and laughing. Clifton shut the door behind him, “I am sorry for that.”
Whitechapel: The Final Stand of Sherlock Holmes (Gentlemen's Edition) Page 4
