Boneseeker

by Brynn Chapman

“It is because I want you too much. I told you. I want…everything from you.” My face burns with the utter truth of it.

  My hateful analytical side whispers, playing devil’s advocate.

  Fear waters my mouth. Do I mean it? I will crush her soul.

  My mind fills with images. Arabella, in her trousers, dig after dig, year after year; with every scene her face more lined, her auburn hair lighter.

  Desire and devotion vibrate every inch of me. Yes. I do mean it.

  Profound relief washes over me as weakness floods my knees.

  Her eyes are huge and electric, weighing my every word. Watching every emotion cross my face.

  “If you cannot give me your hand, I’ll wait. But your heart. May I have it?”

  I extend my hand palm up, waiting.

  She smiles, and tears threaten, but do not fall.

  She nods. “Yes, Henry. You already do.” And slides her other hand into mine. “You always have.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Don’t treat me like a normal woman

  Abner Farmhouse

  Bella

  I’m shivering. Opening my eyes feels like prying open a nailed coffin. I squint and wait as they adjust to the dim light of my room.

  The pink fingers of dawn are just stretching across the horizon.

  My mind whirrs awake and I picture a clock’s gears as the data flows before me in a steady, visual stream.

  Stygian’s ring. The tattoo. The giant and the skeleton. How do they all fit? I flip the images round in my mind like a giant puzzle, trying to organize them.

  Henry was supposed to wake me. Perhaps he overslept?

  I fight my way out of the coverlets and quickly dress. I turn to pick up my chisel, my pistol and my bravery.

  I’m not frightened of the dig or claustrophobia or even Stygian. I’m afraid of Henry. And his capacity to destroy me.

  Work is safe. Work is logical. Working out puzzles is calming; matters of the heart…are none of those things.

  I shake my head, banishing the thoughts and sneak into the hall. Downstairs there are signs of life. The smell of eggs frying amidst some low murmurs.

  I reach Henry’s room and turn the knob.

  I step in and freeze. His bed is empty.

  Anger and fear battle in my chest.

  What if something happened to him?

  My mind whispers, you mean, what if Stygian happened to him.

  My eyes flash around the room. His pack is gone. He’s left without me.

  Anger wins, incinerating fear. Henry has a bizarre preoccupation with my safety. Father had it too, but he never stopped me from learning, doing. Would he have left me out of the dig, just to protect me?

  I grind my teeth together and head down the servant’s staircase which will allow me to sneak past the prying eyes of the kitchen staff.

  I pass through the door, undetected, into the weak morning light.

  The early morning air is frigid. The sun’s crept higher, and I can walk without fear now as I reach the stables.

  In minutes, I’m galloping across the pumpkin patch, orange orbs rushing past like a strange scene plucked from the pages of my beloved Wonderland.

  I hear Henry’s voice in my head. Counting off our extraordinary circumstances. Fear flutters my heart, and I look for them.

  They are near, my little black sentries; the hair rises on the back of my neck as if I’m being watched.

  The butterflies stay with me till the first snowflake falls. Long after their normal counterparts have fled for the southern hemisphere.

  A little croak escapes my lips. They are here; an undulating black mass, which hovers from tree to tree like a flock of migrating birds. Following me.

  I swallow. How can I deny them? They defy explanation.

  Is Henry correct? That some events cannot be explained away?

  “Ha!” I kick the horse’s sides and put my head down against the wind till I reach the line of trees.

  My mind ruminates. One scientist perished in the Hudson, or at least that is where his body was deposited. One possibly melted away, dissolved in a sausage vat.

  I shiver. Two to go. Where are you gentlemen?

  I reach the trees and slow my mare to a trot.

  Three packs lie open on the forest floor.

  My heart free-falls.

  Henry, Montgomery and Stygian’s, alongside a yawning hole in the earth. A mineshaft?

  I am stunned. I slide off the horse and quickly flick his reins around a tree and slide the pistol into my pants.

  I skulk forward and freeze. Laughter wafts up from the shaft below.

  I peer down, over the edge and three faces turn up to meet mine.

  Montgomery, oblivious and joyous. Stygian sporting a one-sided smile that screams you are not needed, woman.

  And Henry with trepidation. “You’re up and about. One of the hands told me you were ill last night. So we let you sleep.”

  “What? I’m quite well.”

  Stygian interjects, “How perfectly odd. Well, you’re here now. Miss Holmes, we’ve found another way to extract the other hand. Would you be a dear and throw down our packs?”

  His smile is sickening.

  “Fine.”

  I squint and discern the outline of the long skeletal fingers jutting out, half-buried in the dirt. My eyes dart to the hole in the rock wall behind them, large enough for a man to pass.

  It must be a series of connected tunnels. How many? How far do they go?

  I look up, and the butterflies alight. “You’re a load of help, whatever you are.”

  I throw their pack down. “Another skeleton? You’ve found another? This is a burial ground, then?”

  Henry is digging and carefully tapping around a metacarpal with his chisel. He shrugs. “I expect so?”

  Stygian’s black eyes flick to me. “Only time will tell, Miss Holmes.”

  Henry continues to shoot me furtive looks till they’re finally out of the hole, hand, in hand.

  In another hour, the hand is secured for transport and we’re back at the farmhouse, packing.

  Henry tries once again to explain, attempts to distract my foul countenance with the case at hand.

  His eyes darken. “I reviewed my London papers. A man with Stygian’s description is wanted…for murder and still at large. A tattoo was mentioned but not its exact description. And his brother…was sent to the gallows by none other than Sherlock Holmes.” He pauses, letting it sink in.

  “L’uomo Deliquente was functioning as a vigilante group—performing executions, and it’s rumored they engineered a few rapes for women they deemed to be harlots. It all fell apart when they targeted a barrister’s daughter. He made it his personal mission to bring them down. L’uomo Deliquente headquarters was raided and its members dispersed about two years prior.”

  I stand and begin to pace. “Or defected. Around the time Stygian arrived for his post at the Mutter.”

  Henry nods. He must see my response as an opening in my mood because he says, “I still don’t understand why you’re so angry. I was merely trying to be a gentleman.”

  I whirl on him. “How many times must I tell you? I do not think like other women, Henry.” I tap my temple roughly. “Don’t be the gentleman. Ask me what I want. Not what convention dictates you do.”

  Henry’s face reddens with anger. He nods. “I’m sorry. I’m sure you were disappointed not to be present.”

  I pace, throwing clothes haphazardly into a bag. “I don’t understand why we must take the hand to the Mutter? Shouldn’t Stygian? We should stay and dig.”

  Henry’s hand massages his stubbled cheeks. He’s forgotten to shave; his face looks years older with the growth hiding his boyish features.

  “It is odd, I agree. Unless Stygian is just determined he and Montgomery should get all the fame.”

  My eyes narrow. “Or unless he has something to hide here. But he has some
thing to hide in Philadelphia as well. Do you remember the paper’s headline, about the tainted sausage sickening patrons? The morning you noticed Stygian’s tattoo.”

  Henry’s eyebrows pull together and his face drains to paper-white.

  “Oh my word! The ingredient list! You are thinking of the sausage factory. Could a man be such a monster? To grind up a human and fashion him into sausage? One of the lost four? You think there is a connection with the tainted sausages.” I nod. “But without proof, it is all conjecture. We know he has ties to someone at the factory. Tight ties, for the person to take such a risk for him. The proprietor’s name is William Bane.”

  “Time will tell. There is never enough of it. Speaking of time,” he snaps his pocket watch closed, “we have to hurry.”

  In an hour, Henry, John and I are on a train, speeding toward the Mutter. The mysterious hand is under our seat, locked safely in a box.

  Oddly, the unearthed hand matched our hand. Why was the skeleton in pieces, in different locations?

  “Henry, why would the hands be so far apart?”

  Henry shrugs. “Could it have been dismembered? Animal degradation?”

  John beats me to it. “The skeleton shows no signs of trauma. Just ancient decay.”

  I nod in agreement. “Someone moved them. Perhaps they were interrupted, and moved it piece-meal.”

  My foot taps. I cannot wait to return; hoping and praying Stygian doesn’t further tamper with the burial ground.

  I stare out the window, still irritated at Henry as he and his father exchange endless jibes.

  “If you wouldn’t of touched it, Henry, we could of analyzed—”

  “The body was on me, father. I’m sorry if I panicked. I was bloody fourteen.”

  They both laugh, and turn to me when I’m silent.

  Watson touches my arm, his tone placating. “Arabella. It’s a few days. You’ll be back in the dirt in no time.”

  I don’t answer. As we pull away from the station, I see a black cluster of wings depart, up and over the train. I shiver.

  John clears his throat. This means he’s changing subjects; I’m not surprised that his face, which was full of mirth moments ago is suddenly deadly serious.

  I roll my eyes. “Yes Dr. Watson?”

  I try not to be amused as their identical lips curl into wry smiles at my retort.

  “Be careful of Stygian,” John’s voice drops an octave.

  Henry interrupts, “You worked that out on your own then? That he’s dangerous? I must admit, I’ve haven’t been giving you enough credit.” Henry laughs.

  John shoots him a death-look. “I…found one of his papers in his office. He believes in L’uomo Delinquente.”

  “Which is?” Henry and I ask in unison, playing innocent.

  “It means he believes people’s physical traits can predict a person’s personality. It’s similar to phrenology, but instead of the skull alone, it’s applied to the entire person. One can imagine the potential problems of that premise.”

  I nod. “Yes. Skeletons change for so many reasons. Trauma, birth, wear and tear. It may all affect a person’s appearance. A hunched back, a twisted spine—on and on.”

  Henry nods ascension. “It seems very unpredictable. Too many variables to be called a real science.”

  “You mean like phrenology?” I jab.

  Henry shrugs. “I never said I believed it to be true science. It’s a lot of show.”

  “A sideshow,” I mutter.

  “Bella, really—”

  John cuts him off. “Children, do pay attention.”

  John leans in. “Take that chap over there.” He nods discretely. “According to L’uomo, his protruded, sloping forehead and cauliflower ears indicate he’s a biological throwback. A savage.”

  Henry’s eyes tick over the gent. “Ridiculous. He’s reading the Philadelphia paper.” His eyebrows push together as he squints. “His shoes are polished to perfection and expensive. His hands and nails are smooth and impeccable. He has money and servants. The heading on the paper poking from his attaché would indicate he’s a barrister. If he’s a savage—then he’s a very well-educated one.”

  I clap appreciatively. A flash of text appears in my mind and I bite my lip. Perhaps it is time to confess.

  “I do remember reading of it in England. I’ve heard nothing of it here?” I prompt, fishing.

  “Yes, it hasn’t caught on in the states,” John says.

  “That would indicate Stygian has colleagues in Europe. His American accent rings false, somehow. I cannot place it.”

  Henry nods. “Yes. It’s an odd mix of sounds. Neither Northern nor Southern.”

  John’s eyes narrow. “Their society was not purely academic—as they portrayed to the public at large. There were murmurs of vigilantism in the halls of Scotland Yard.”

  “I thought they merely wished to educate the public on the theories of Darwin?” Henry says.

  John continues, “They were radical atheists with a leaning toward eugenics. Their members sought to maneuver political leanings toward their cause. They saw a new world of influence here, and plan to insert their candidates into the judicial system, to force change from within.”

  “Better for the public to believe in them, in their version of government, than in a creator?” I offer.

  Henry’s eyes flick to mine and away. “Yes, here men’s rights are endowed by the creator, as per their constitution. It would be necessary to undermine self-reliance, replacing it with government. Ultimate control, really.”

  John seems confounded by our complete comprehension.

  “Ah, my two youthful sleuths.” John gives Henry a wide paternal smile. “It couldn’t help but rub off, I suppose.”

  Henry puffs, disgusted. “Hmm. Holmes may have the upper hand to me—but you, father. I’d say we’re evenly matched.”

  John opens his mouth to protest.

  “Boys. Save the spitting match for later.”

  Henry meets my gaze. I now have no excuse for excluding John from our information. He suspects him of belonging to L’uomo Deliquente and hasn’t chastised me or insisted I return to the Mutter.

  Our eyes hold a silent conversation. He nods.

  My eyes flick away from Henry’s to his face. “John.”

  “Yes, darling?” The sparkle in his blue eyes dims at my expression. “What is it?”

  “Henry and I…have much to tell you.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Memories, Resurrected

  The Music Hall

  Henry

  “So the hand is safe, father?” My eyes dart around the music hall. I can’t shake the sensation we’re being watched.

  “Yes. I delivered it myself this morning whilst you and the princess slept.”

  Father’s eyes keep leaving mine. I know what he’s looking for. I raise an eyebrow. “Calm yourself old man. You’ll have a seizure. She’ll be along before the orchestra plays.”

  Father’s head shoots back. “You little insolent—”

  “John!”

  Violet is rushing across the marble floor, a vision of color and lace. She moves with the grace of a much younger woman.

  Father grasps both her hands, and leans in to kiss her cheek. I look around awkwardly.

  “Henry? Is that you?”

  I cannot believe I am actually relieved to hear Priscilla’s voice, but even speaking to her is better than watching my father and Violet get reacquainted.

  I walk over to her. She is lovely, there’s no denying that. Her long blond hair adorns her head in a crown of curls.

  I don’t feel anything, though. Admiring her beauty is simply like appreciating a glorious painting.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d be here. Father said you’d delivered another specimen to the Mutter.”

  “Yes, just this morning. We’re only here till tomorrow, then it’s back to the dig.”

  Her face puckers
. “Where’s your partner?”

  A stab of irritation heats my face. “Bella, should be along shortly. Why do you ask?”

  Priscilla steps in, so close. Too close. I avert my eyes. Her hand trails down my chest. “I was hoping to have you to myself. Not that she’s really a rival or anything. I mean, look at her.”

  “Pardon me?” I firmly grasp her wrist and and return it to her side.

  Priscilla takes one step backward. “Really, Henry. She’s fine for the museum, but who would have her? The girl has no idea what is proper, what is ladylike—”

  I hold up a hand, grind my teeth and spit, “Arabella has more integrity than anyone I know, and more honesty. You’re right—she’s not proper; but that is only because she is incapable of pretense.”

  Her expression turns quizzical. “How do you mean?”

  “She cannot lie, or pretend. Whatever is in her mind usually shoots directly out her mouth.”

  Priscilla smiles. “Exactly. Who could want such a woman as a wife, yes? I do hope you’ve been thinking about our conversation. I’ve told father about it and I—”

  “Priscilla. I should sugarcoat it. Convention tells me to do so, but I have not the time. You and I—we will not be venturing any further.”

  Her mouth widens in a huge O. I’m quite certain by her look of horror that she’s never been spurned.

  “You prefer her? That odd, unfashionable—”

  Anger surges. “That’s quite enough. And yes, I prefer her to you. To anyone really, male or female.”

  “What?” Her foot stamps beneath her ivory dress, sending shimmery undulations down the train.

  “Did I stammer?”

  A picture of white Foxglove pops to my head. Beautiful, deadly flowers. Like her.

  I spin and tug at the collar of my shirt, knowing I’ve made a terrible enemy.

  ###

  Bella

  “Where is Henry?”

  I smooth the dress and fidget with the vanilla gloves.

  I duck into an alcove and close my eyes, sucking in deep, calming breaths.

  I detest crowds. The opera house is sold out. Every seat filled with whining, fan-fluttering ladies and pompous men. I detest feigning interest, especially with women.