The Hammer Horror Omnibus

by John Burke

  At least this made a change from the usual plea to be allowed to decorate my fashionable surgery. It still did not appeal to me.

  “I don’t think you quite appreciate the nature of our work there,” I said, “or the type of people we have to deal with.”

  “I have heard all that is necessary,” she said.

  “Hearing it and dealing with it in reality are very different things.”

  She quivered with annoyance. I could see that she was easily aroused and that she would be passionate about everything that concerned her—personally or philosophically. What she needed was a strong-willed man to distract her.

  She said severely: “It’s time we women ceased being purely ornamental. I am sure I could be very useful, and my aunt tells me you have so very little free time. You must need someone to help you.”

  “Your aunt?”

  “Countess Barscynska.”

  It appeared that I was to be forever the target of the Countess’s plans.

  I said: “You live with her?”

  “I am staying for a few weeks, and then I may settle in the district. My parents live in the capital.”

  It was time I dealt with my patients. They needed me; and I, for my part, needed their fees to subsidize my life’s work.

  “I’m sure your aunt can find other good works for you to do,” I said, going to the door and waiting for her to accept this dismissal so that I could open it and usher her out. “Please pay her my respects.”

  Margaret Conrad did not move. “I shall be at the Hospital at nine o’clock tomorrow morning.”

  “Miss Conrad, I thought I had made it clear: your services are not required.”

  She seemed amused. There was not so much a twinkle as an ironic gleam in those disconcertingly direct eyes. “You have an exaggerated opinion of your own power,” she said lightly. “My father is the Minister responsible for all hospitals and asylums. He has agreed that I shall work with you. So you see, Doctor Stein, you have no choice. Nine o’clock, Doctor?”

  I could have stood up to this and argued it at great length with the Minister, but I did not wish to jeopardize my position. My secret labors in the underground laboratory were what counted: the rest was only a façade, so what did it matter if some over-eager idealist thrust herself upon me?

  I said: “As you say, Miss Conrad, I have no choice.”

  She softened a little. “I shall not interfere with your work, Doctor. I promise you that.”

  She had no way of guessing how true this was. Nor would she ever guess what my real work was.

  As it happened, I was not visiting the Hospital at all the following day. I dealt with the usual group of patients in the morning and drove out on a round of visits in the early afternoon. Then I lay on my bed for two hours, not sleeping but conserving my energies. This evening was to be an important one, and I did not propose to embark on it even mildly tired as a consequence of the day’s exertions.

  Hans Kleve had asked if he might spend some time in the Hospital and I had seen no reason to demur. It would not increase his popularity with his fellow members of the Medical Council, but this was no cause for lamentation: I could imagine the stirrings of alarm when they discovered that one of their number had, as it were, defected to the enemy. Hans took my place on this day. I imagined that he would be more soothing and sympathetic than I was towards the idlers and degenerates who frequented the Workhouse. When his day was ended he went home to change, and then after dark called for me at my surgery.

  We had a glass of wine before setting out, and while we drank it he told me of the appearance of Margaret Conrad that morning. It had taken him quite by surprise. I apologized for not notifying him of her impending arrival, but I had really had very little time to do so: she had announced her intentions one day, and put them into effect the next.

  “She seems a very determined young lady,” he agreed.

  “Get her to wash one of the patients,” I advised. “That should scare her away.”

  He then told me with amusement but also with a certain grudging admiration of her resolves on this first day. She had announced that she intended to read to the sick—which prompted me to remark that she would have difficulty making herself heard in that bedlam. She also wished to buy things which they needed, such as writing paper and soap. Hans had told her that the inmates rarely washed and never wrote.

  Apparently she had also met Karl Werner. The dwarf had come in with a message for Hans, who had automatically introduced him. Karl had bobbed a grotesque little bow and Margaret had held out her hand, only to realize too late that the dwarf’s warped arm could not make the necessary response. It had been an embarrassing moment, but Hans assured me that the young woman had covered it with a warm, sympathetic smile. “Karl was quite taken with her,” he observed. I was not surprised by this. The dwarf’s consciousness of his own ugly frame had, if anything, intensified his appreciation of true beauty when he saw it. Margaret Conrad would have attracted any healthy man; her effect on the dwarf must have been considerable.

  When we had finished our drinks I fetched my cloak.

  “Ready?”

  “I’m ready,” Hans said eagerly.

  Tonight we were going to give Karl Werner his new body. The dwarf would disappear and never be seen again.

  We made our way quickly through the darkened streets. Somebody somewhere was singing a plaintive chorale, and in the upper room of a shabby house a man and woman were screaming abuse at each other. Doubtless the customary uproar prevailed in the Workhouse Hospital; and in the fashionable salons of my wealthier patients there would be the usual, shrill, meaningless chatter. It was all remote now. Everything but the task which lay ahead was insignificant to me.

  When we entered the cellar, Karl had already removed the cover from the tank. The body floated gently in its sustaining fluid. The wrists were completely healed. As soon as we had been admitted, the dwarf went back to contemplating the body that was soon to be his.

  I hung up my cloak and indicated that Hans should do the same. I began to take surgical instruments from the stock which I had built up over these last few years. As I laid them on a clean cloth, I caught an apprehensive glance from the dwarf.

  Hans put a sympathetic hand on Karl’s shoulder and directed his attention away from the gleaming instruments and back towards the tank.

  “Keep looking at him, Karl. In a few hours that will be you.”

  Leaving the dwarf, he came to help me with my preparations.

  We moved two benches into the centre of the main cellar and cleared them of every scrap of equipment. On each bench I spread a cloth which had been scrubbed white. Then Hans and I climbed up beside the tank and carefully lifted out the dripping body. As Karl watched, willing us not to drop or damage it, we laid it on one of the benches.

  Against the wall was a wooden frame on which the dwarf and I had worked for months. He jumped readily to my assistance as I manoeuvred it into position. We then spent a good hour assembling the network of wires and terminals for which the frame had been constructed.

  Finally I was ready.

  The body lay on one bench. I looked at the other bench, and then at Karl Werner. He stared back at me steadily. He was pale but unfaltering. I nodded once, and like a well-trained animal he scrambled on to the empty bench and stretched himself out to his full length—which was paltry enough.

  Hans stood over him and soaked a pad in chloroform. He smiled down encouragingly. The dwarf summoned up an answering grin. Then Hans pressed the pad over his mouth and nostrils.

  I waited until Hans had checked the dwarf’s breathing and his pulse. Then he stood back without a word.

  I selected a scalpel and bent over the still, sleeping head. I had planned the exact incisions so long and had gone over every movement so meticulously in theory that I was able to work swiftly and without hesitation. It was simple and speedy. In a matter of minutes Hans was holding out a jar of fluid into which I gently dropped the brain. It flo
ated for a moment, then sank slowly to the bottom like a bulbous, fissured creature of the sea.

  When I had watched Hans place the jar safely to one side, I returned to the mindless body of the dwarf. I bound up the head to prevent the steady drip of blood, and then injected embalming fluid into the veins. The flawed body would be an engrossing study when I could find time to spare.

  Together we turned our attention to the business of wiring the framework to the inert body which was to be Karl Werner’s. When the main connections had been made I lowered the brain into place and, under the most intense light we could achieve with our limited resources, devoted myself for what seemed an age to the minuscule operation of establishing the nerve connections and fibres.

  It was early morning before we were able to enclose the head in a thick band of brass, padded on the inside, with terminals set in at two-inch intervals.

  I started up the Whimshurst machine. Energy began to pulse through the wires, dinning in the very walls of the cellars. If it had not been that I had thoroughly tested the equipment at full pressure before committing myself to the further construction of this laboratory, I would have feared that the noise would have brought the authorities down upon us.

  After a while, with my watch laid on the bench before me, I signalled to Hans to slow the spinning, flashing wheel down to half speed and keep it there. Then I turned my full attention to the body on the bench.

  It was beginning to twitch. Life pulsed into it rhythmically, inexorably. One hand started to beat out a steady tempo on the bench—and then closed, opened again, groped convulsively at the air as though in pain, and pushed itself up like a mad creature dragging the arm after it.

  Suddenly the hand grabbed at one of the overhead wires and pulled it down in a shower of crackling sparks.

  The body writhed in pain.

  “Turn it off!” I yelled at Hans. He slammed the control down, and the machine whined to a halt. I waved him towards the bench. “Anaesthetic!”

  To make way for him, I touched one of the wires with the intention of moving it away from the head. A shock jolted through me. I drew on gloves and managed to clear a space near the head so that Hans could stoop over it with the anaesthetic pad.

  The convulsions in the body subsided. When it was quite still I put my ear to the heart and listened.

  It was all right. My creation was still alive.

  We set to work to clean up the laboratory. I tested the machinery again and established that it was safe. Karl’s new body slept peacefully on the bench. Calm settled upon the cellars. The job had been done. There was nothing to do now but wait. Hans helped me to clean my instruments and put them tidily away. Every now and then he glanced at the prone figure.

  “How long before he shows any signs of animation?”

  “An hour or so,” I said. “When he regains consciousness, his brain will take some time to adjust itself to his new body. He must have complete rest, and avoid any abrupt or violent movement. As a precaution I shall keep him strapped down for a few days.”

  “It was a superb operation, Doctor,” said Hans with heartwarming respect in his voice.

  I bowed my thanks. This was only the beginning of our work together, and I felt that I had chosen a worthy assistant—though it was rather a case, I thought ruefully, of his choosing me.

  The chimpanzee began to chatter in his corner. We had forgotten all about him for many hours now. Feeding him had been one of Karl’s duties, but Karl would not be in a position to carry this out for some time. I took some raw meat on a dish from the store cupboard and fed it in to Otto, who pounced greedily on it.

  Otto himself had played a not inconsiderable part in the developments which led up to my final creation of a man. For my first experiment with a live brain I had used reptiles. I removed the brain from a lizard and replaced it with that of a frog. The lizard attempted to jump but this, of course, was physically impossible. It would have been interesting to see whether in the fullness of time it was able to adapt to this; but such a line of research was not my immediate concern. My theory had been proved: the brain continued its normal function regardless of its environment. Eventually I used anthropoids, and gave Otto the brain of an orangutan. The success of the transplanting gave me the courage to go on. Not only was I able to avoid the mistakes that had almost resulted in my death after my first experiments in my home: my dexterity had improved over the years, and I did not see how anything could go wrong this time.

  I turned back to Hans.

  “We can’t leave our new friend here. I want to keep him under constant observation, and I really can’t make the journey out here several times a day. We must get him to the Hospital. There’s an attic room we can use.”

  “Won’t that be dangerous?”

  “I’ll ensure that nobody can get in.”

  “I was thinking of him,” said Hans. “So soon after the operation . . .”

  “We’ll take good care of him.”

  Hans, on my instructions, rode swiftly to a nearby private hospital in which I frequently installed some of my wealthier patients. He harnessed a horse to the ambulance and brought it rattling through the streets to the City Gate. We transferred Karl on a stretcher from the laboratory to the ambulance, and drove off before the watchman on his rounds could grow too inquisitive.

  On one corner a loose cobblestone threw the vehicle to one side and I had difficulty in steadying the stretcher. Hans drove as carefully as possible, but the streets of Carlsbruck had not been designed for the smooth transport of delicate mechanisms—which is what, in his present state, the new Karl Werner was.

  I was thankful when we reached the Workhouse Hospital. Dawn was already a chalky smear in the eastern sky. The city would soon be awakening.

  We carried Karl in through a side entrance and up a little-used flight of stone steps. Manipulating the stretcher round some of the corners was no simple task. We were breathing hard when we attained the top and laid the stretcher down in a cramped room with one narrow bed against the wall.

  Gently we lifted Karl on to the bed. I went down to fetch straps with which to secure him. A bout of coughing came from the ward, and there were the usual moans of protest. As I hastened back to the top of the building I thought I detected a flicker of movement at the end of a corridor as though someone was watching; but when I paused and waited, there was no repetition. I was tired and my nerves were on edge.

  We fastened Karl to the bed so that he could not tear himself free. He might be alarmed when he woke, but I intended to spend as much time with him as I could spare from my routine duties, and would soon set his mind at rest.

  Karl had not stirred. We were about to leave him when, without warning, he opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. Then a stab of pain twisted his face. He let out a wild scream.

  I went down beside the bed and gripped his shoulder.

  “It’s all right,” I said. “Karl—it’s all right.”

  He moaned and tried to turn, but the bonds held him fast.

  “Gently, Karl,” I went on in a low, soothing tone. “Relax. You’re quite safe. Soon you’ll be comfortable. Sleep, Karl . . . sleep.”

  His eyes flickered and then shut again. I waited until I was sure that he would not cry out again. He was bound to have some pain at this stage. I hoped I could keep it to a minimum. But whatever happened, in the end it would surely be worth it.

  Hans and I left the Hospital as surreptitiously as we had come, and went out into the brightening dawn.

  5

  All that week I succeeded in maintaining a balance between my medical practice, my work in the Hospital, and the constant care which Karl required. Now I was more than ever thankful for Hans Kleve. He took some of the weight from me, particularly in the Hospital. I will not say that he did this entirely for scientific or humanitarian reasons: he was by no means indifferent to the presence of Margaret Conrad, and brought her name into the conversation whenever it was possible to do so—as he thought—pla
usibly. Whatever his motives, however, I welcomed his assistance. If he chose to dally in the grim corridors now and then with Margaret, I had no objections to raise.

  By the end of the first week I was able to remove the last bandage from Karl’s head. He had suffered great pain and his face had sunk slightly, but once he was on his feet and eating properly it would fill out again quickly enough. The only thing that worried me was his slowness in mastering the use of his vocal chords. I had anticipated some small delay and perhaps a certain amount of incoherence at first, but with nothing to do all day but lie on his back I would have expected a more satisfactory attempt than he seemed capable of making.

  Also, each time that I came to give him treatment and encourage him, his eyes showed abject fear rather than gratitude. This could only be attributed to the constant pain. When this slackened, he would be a more rational being.

  I was patient with him, trying to coax him on.

  “Can you hear me, Karl?”

  Ten times a day I started thus. And each time he gurgled in his throat and then, wretchedly, gave up and nodded.

  “You’re making wonderful progress,” I assured him.

  When he strained against the straps I explained how essential they were. In his sleep, or in a moment of itching discomfort, he might move unwisely, and our good work would be undone. At the end of all such explanations he nodded again, but in resignation rather than cheerful acceptance.

  I kept his diet severely restricted. It was even necessary to teach him to swallow, and often he dribbled like an infant.

  Nevertheless I reiterated that he was making great progress. “We’ll soon have you leading a normal life,” I promised him; and when I persisted, he tried to summon up a pathetic smile.

  When there was a lull downstairs, Hans hastened to join me. He was anxious to be present at every crucial stage. I had to assure him that I would fetch him when there was any significant development.

  After the first few days, when I realized that Karl’s progress was likely to be slower than we had first envisaged, I laid down a programme. While he remained strapped to the bed we would concentrate on speech and on study of his eyes. Hans gave him a regular massage, but I forbade any ambitious movement of the limbs until the time was ripe. When the moment came for the tests on movement, I told Hans to adjust his work in the Hospital accordingly.