Skin and Bone--A Mystery

by Robin Blake

  She beckoned me on and we walked past two stacks covered by tarpaulin.

  ‘Them’s the bark stacks, and here’s where the hides are scraped.’

  A middle-aged woman was standing at a slate table and working a palette knife back and forth across the inside surface of a fresh hide. This produced pink curls of meat and lumps of white fat.

  ‘That’s me mam.’

  The woman looked up and smiled for her daughter.

  ‘We waste nowt, mister,’ she called without ceasing to work.

  ‘The lean she’s scraping off makes what they call tanner’s meat,’ her daughter added. ‘We sell it for dog food at a penny a pound. The fat we keep and use. We render it for tallow, which we rub into the leather to make it supple.’

  And so we proceeded around the edge of the skin-yard, past the shallow lime pits where the hides were dipped to remove the hair; the bark mill, where the oak bark was crushed; the salting and soaking vats for preserving untanned hides; the stretchers, the drying frames and currying tables. None of this gear was new and much of was in ill-repair. By the end of our tour, as we walked past the lean-tos in which the skinners lived and arrived again at the ruined lodge beside the gateway arch, I was well versed in the art and labour of leather-making.

  ‘Daniel Gogarty seemed to be saying there is one set on destroying the skin-yard,’ I said. ‘Is this true?’

  Ellen’s face screwed up as if she’d taken a mouthful of vinegar.

  ‘That’s Abraham Scroop, the bits and bones merchant. He buys our scraps off us for his business, but he’s not liked here. He’s been boasting for years that he can run the skin-yard better than us, but it only means he wants the profit. This place supports three families at the present – that’s the Kites, Gogartys and Brocks. But this is town land and if Scroop has his way the Corporation will kick us families out and give it over to his family.’

  ‘If they did, he would happen have you work for him. He would need those that have the skill.’

  She spat.

  ‘Work for him? I’d rather dig graves.’

  I took out my watch.

  ‘Well I must go. It is near the time of the inquest, where I shall see you again, Ellen. But wait! I almost forgot my other purpose in coming down here.’

  I produced the summons from my pocket.

  ‘Will you give this to Kathy Brock? I thought I would see her here, but have not.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘A notice, like the one you got, requiring her to attend the inquest as a witness.’

  A look of concern slid across Ellen’s face, like a cloud’s shadow on a cornfield.

  ‘Oh! But she is not here, Sir,’ she said. ‘She has gone away this morning.’

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘To her uncle in Wigan.’

  Chapter 6

  RETURNING TO THE bath house I found Luke Fidelis washing his hands in the bucket of water he had used the previous day to test the baby’s lung.

  ‘You have finished the dissection? What do you conclude?’

  He fished a small towel from his instruments bag, dried his hands and, his voice edged with triumph, said, ‘I have found something extraordinary.’

  ‘Go on’

  ‘I think it proves this baby was born alive, and it gives reason to believe that she was outwardly healthy.’

  ‘Tell me!’

  Fidelis seemed to be considering whether to do so, enjoying the moment like a horse trader that weighs up a buyer’s offer. He said at last, ‘No, let me think a little more and make sure of it for myself. How long have I before the inquest starts?’

  ‘Forty minutes.’

  ‘Then I shall go to the writing room at the inn and set down my findings now. There is nothing like writing something down to make it clarify.’

  ‘Luke, this is intolerable! It can only take a few seconds for you to tell me.’

  ‘No. I’ll give you my findings from the witness chair and not before.’

  He closed his medical bag and strode out of the room, his lips compressed in a thin and perhaps mischievous smile. There had always been this theatrical side to my friend’s character.

  He left me thinking of the consequences of what he had confided in me, that the baby had lived and been well. If it were true, it would be more than ever necessary to find the mother of this child, and more than ever difficult to do so. While a girl that had concealed a stillbirth might overcome her shame through remorse, a murderess would be more intransigent. Then the thought of Kathy Brock, fleeing to Wigan, came to my mind. Was I wrong about Hannah Parson’s allegation after all? Had Kathy indeed given birth to this child? And had she now gone away to evade the inquest and the exposure of the truth?

  The Skeleton Inn’s gloomy upper room was crowded and smelly as I opened the business. I regretted even more its lack of dignity as the setting for legal proceedings. The small dormer windows, filthy-paned, let in such little light that I was forced to ask for candles, while the timbers creaked like a ship as the people crowded in. The landlord, his establishment destitute of benches, had found trestles and laid floorboards across them to create half a dozen wobbling forms for the public to sit on, and these had been filled so tightly that those occupying the ends sat braced to avoid being forced to the floor.

  The skinners, led by Barnaby Kite and ranged together along the foremost of these makeshift benches, were receiving foul looks and prejudiced comments from those behind them. But it was the constitution of the jury that gave me more concern. As I administered their oaths I thought them an unpromising lot. Like so many sailors in the King’s service these were pressed men, and not necessarily suited to the intended task, or even willing to perform it. But the naval captain had the advantage over me by being allowed to whip his men into shape. Jurors cannot be forced to work well – to understand the evidence or come together in their thinking. They are presumed to have no faults, and to be rational and right in their hearts. It is a most foolish presumption.

  A summons to serve on a jury is often welcome: it raises the pulse of one’s monotonous life and offers a few hours off work, with food and drink provided. But soon enough Jack’s remembering the way Georgie-Porgie looked at Jill; Georgie-Porgie rekindles an old quarrel with Tommy Tucker; and Dr Foster frets over missing the coach to Gloucester. The group of twelve men that I cast my eye over today looked not immune to discontents of this kind. All lived or worked in the immediate neighbourhood, and would know each other pretty well. A group of six that included Jacob Bull the wheelwright, Peter Johnson the signwriter and John Talbot the potter were innocuous enough. Not so Leonard Tiddy the nurseryman and William Trent the fuller. These were neighbours and brothers-in-law and but brothers in little else, since it was well known they could agree on nothing. Nor would Old John Borthwick be easy to handle. He had been court tipstaff in his day and so reckoned that he knew more about the law than the Lord Chief Justice. His son Young John sat compliantly beside him, and would not dare go against his father. Finally I was disconcerted to see that Furzey had chosen to summon Bartholomew Lock. He was supervisor in Scroop’s business, and well known to be exacting in his own work and loudly opinionated of everyone else’s. Beside him sat Laurence Jones, his meek assistant and acolyte.

  I trooped them all up to the bath house to carry out the viewing. Inside the sluicing room they stared in fascinated horror at the table on which the baby’s remains were displayed.

  ‘The little babby’s been all injured and stitched up again,’ said John Talbot. ‘A shame, I call that.’

  ‘The doctor has examined him, John,’ I explained. ‘He needed to open the skull.’

  ‘The doctor cut open its head? He didn’t ought to do that.’

  ‘It was necessary. You will hear his evidence later.’

  ‘Dr Harrod, is that?’ asked old Borthwick.

  ‘I refer to Dr Fidelis.’

  ‘But I’ve heard Harrod’s got his evidence to give an’ all.’

  ‘Yes, he
is on the list.’

  ‘So there’s two doctors we got to hear,’ said Lock. ‘That’ll double the lies we’ll be told, then.’

  In order to steer the matter back to the pathetic object before us I took hold of it and gently turned it face down.

  ‘I ask you all to look carefully. Notice the injury to the back of her head. See?’

  They craned forward as one, mouths hanging open.

  ‘Did Doctor do that, an’ all?’

  This was Leonard Tiddy.

  ‘No. It was there when we found it. Later you will hear Dr Fidelis’s opinion on that also.’

  Bartholomew Lock was unimpressed.

  ‘And shall we hear the doctor’s opinion on the national debt and the war?’

  By the end of the viewing most of the jurors had had something to say. This is usually the case. When death is present in company the natural thing is to cover the discomfort with chatter, not to any useful end, but aimlessly and sometimes facetiously. There was one, however, who did not say a word, and that was Jacob Bull the wheelwright. As we made our way out of the room I saw that Jacob’s eyes gleamed with tears. His wife had given birth to a stillborn only a few weeks before.

  Returning to the inn we found the room full of people jostling each other for space. Not improving matters were some of the older ladies of quality, who considered it necessary to venture out on formal occasions – which they deemed this to be – in their hooped skirts and with fans to mask their faces. Struggling through this press to reach my chair I found my way blocked by Dr Harrod.

  ‘May I be first to give evidence, Cragg? I am called to a lady – Lady Rickaby, you know – who has a horrid case of an abscess on her leg and I must change the bandage.’

  I pointed out that, by invariable tradition, the opening witness must be the first finder of the body – in this case Ellen Kite.

  ‘Oh! Then call me second, Cragg, you must.’

  Not only had Fidelis expressed his scorn for the old physician’s judgement, but the evidence of the two doctors was going to be directly contradictory, leading the jury into an impasse which might infuriate them. Here was my chance of avoiding that outcome.

  I said, ‘I am perfectly willing to forego your testimony entirely, Doctor, if you must hurry away. We shall, after all, have that of Dr Fidelis and—’

  He waved his hand to dismiss my suggestion.

  ‘No, no, it is my duty to testify. Relieve Dr Fidelis if you like, but I had better have my say.’

  In the Coroner’s chair one learns diplomacy; I did not press the matter.

  ‘Very well, Dr Harrod, I shall call you to the chair after Ellen has spoken. But I shall also then call Dr Fidelis. Now, if you would be so kind…’

  I manoeuvred my way past him and reached the somewhat wobbly table behind which Furzey and myself had our station.

  The examination of Ellen Kite was not hard. I had the deposition she had made and used this to lead my questions. The result was that the court heard almost exactly the same evidence as she had given Furzey and me on the previous morning.

  ‘No,’ she said in answer to my final question. ‘I don’t know any girl round here that’s got in the family way – not without she’s been married. Not lately, I mean.’

  ‘Thank you Ellen. You may go back to your seat. Dr Harrod?’

  Approaching the witness chair, Dr Harrod turned his head this way and that, with an expression suggesting mild surprise that there should be so many there to listen to him. Before sitting down he removed his hat and in one movement swept the chair seat with it as if to remove a coating of dust. Then he sat down, settled himself comfortably, cleared his throat and turned his face with its pleasant expression towards me.

  ‘Dr Harrod,’ I began. ‘Please tell the court of your inspection of this dead child.’

  ‘I saw it in your company, did I not, Mr Cragg? It was yesterday morning at the bath house up the hill there. As we have just heard, that is close by where it was found.’

  ‘And when you saw it, what did you conclude?’

  ‘I concluded that it was born dead. A sad but not uncommon occurrence, as we know.’

  ‘How did you form this opinion?’

  ‘As I said to you at the time, Sir, I have practised medicine for forty years and I know the appearance of a stillborn.’

  ‘So you made no physical examination?’

  Harrod laughed in his easy, light way.

  ‘Oh, no! There is really no need. I saw the whole matter in one glance – the texture of the skin, its colour, that sort of thing. I suppose some poor girl must have had the baby on the sly, out of wedlock naturally, and finding it born dead thought she might get away scot-free of her indiscretion by quietly disposing of it.’

  ‘Is that a common occurrence, in your experience? Surely it is not easy to be pregnant without the, er, well, the pregnancy showing.’

  ‘I give you my opinion, that is all. But if I may further suggest, you should look for a girl who is naturally fat. An obese girl. Such a one can easily conceal her pregnancy even down to the day of its birth. I have seen that before, indeed I have.’

  ‘Thank you, Dr Harrod. You are excused. May we have Dr Fidelis now?’

  Once Luke Fidelis had taken his seat I went straight to the point.

  ‘Dr Fidelis, what testimony do you have for this inquest about the dead infant?’

  ‘Very significant testimony, Sir. Unlike Dr Harrod, I made a thorough physical examination of the body.’

  ‘And what can you tell us?’

  ‘It is a neonate. A newborn.’

  ‘We have heard the opinion of Dr Harrod that the child was born dead; that it never breathed. Do you agree with him?’

  ‘I do not. I am certain this child was alive when its mother was delivered of it. In addition I believe it was most probably born in good health, and there are indications that the mother did not give birth without knowledge, or assistance.’

  ‘Assistance?’ I interjected. ‘You think she may have been attended at the birth?’

  ‘That is one possibility. I noticed straight away that the navel string had been tied and then cut through in the proper way. It was not torn or bitten apart as I have seen in cases where a girl gives birth alone and ignorance and desperation hold sway. I do not say the mother did not do this herself, of course, but whoever did was acquainted with the correct way to prevent excessive bleeding, and had the necessary equipment to do so.’

  ‘What else did you find when you examined the body?’

  ‘I saw an injury to the back of the skull, a wound. It could only have been caused by a blow from a hard object or by the head being dashed against a hard surface.’

  ‘So this injury could have been a result of the body being thrown down, as for instance into the tanning pit and perhaps striking the slate facing its sides?’

  ‘That is a likely explanation.’

  ‘Did you see any other superficial injury?’

  ‘I did not. But looking into the cavities of the body and, coming in particular to the ears, I saw that one of them was stopped with congealed blood. I supposed at first it had been a chance bleed, perhaps following from the injury to the head already mentioned.’

  The room, which with the restless audience had so far been full of whispers and creaking timber, was becoming quieter now, which I found was often the case when Fidelis gave evidence. There is no doubt that the cogent way in which he spoke, and the uncommon knowledge he deployed, made him a compelling witness. Even Basilius Harrod had waited to hear him, for I saw the old physician standing beside the top of the stairs, his hand cupping one ear. The demands of Lady Rickaby and her abscess could not override his professional curiosity as to what Fidelis might say.

  ‘And was it a chance bleed?’ I asked.

  ‘No. There was nothing of chance about it, and nor was it natural. But I could not determine the truth of the case without opening the head. That I did this morning.’

  ‘What did you find?’r />
  The room was completely silent now, and straining to hear.

  ‘That the ear had been assaulted, Sir. The ear-drum was burst through and the whole hearing apparatus destroyed. Beyond the ear the tissue of the brain itself was grievously damaged.’

  ‘Good heavens! How was this done?’

  Fidelis straightened his back and drew in a long breath through his nose. He looked around the room like an actor about to deliver a decisive line.

  ‘I concluded that someone had pushed an instrument into the baby’s ear far enough to penetrate the brain.’

  There was a communal in-drawing of breath around the room, and a few exclamations of horror. I was no less surprised and horrified than the rest.

  ‘What sort of instrument was that, Doctor?’

  ‘I cannot be precise unless it be found. The best I can tell you is that it was narrow and pointed and at least four inches long. A bodkin, perhaps, or something like. The injury was such that it could only have been caused by such an instrument.’

  ‘So the injury to this newborn child was in your opinion no accident but done on purpose.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘And what could that purpose have been?’

  ‘One only: to kill the baby without leaving an outward trace. And that is why I conclude this was never a stillbirth, as Dr Harrod has averred, but the calculated murder of a baby girl that gave all the appearance of being perfectly healthy.’

  At the sound of the word ‘murder’ a new flux of whispers thrilled through the audience.

  ‘Thank you for your evidence, Doctor. You may step down.’

  Fidelis rose from the chair and forced his way to the back of the room, which now seemed more tightly packed than ever. As he did so the volume of comment and speculation rose to a crescendo around him.

  I let the noise continue. I needed time to think. Fidelis’s dramatic evidence meant that I must after all face the possibility I had discussed with Elizabeth, and also read about in the author Dr Mandevil: a newborn foully murdered at the hands of its mother. What troubled me was the way of the killing. Could a poor fraught young girl – that is all I could conceive her to be – have overriden the prime instincts of motherhood and treated the flesh of her own flesh in such a vile and deliberate way?