Wycliff studied the polished wood and the expensive rug for a moment. He would regret asking his next question, but he wouldn’t let a bout of squeamishness deter him. He needed a full understanding of what happened in the building in order to figure out where things had gone wrong. “What exactly is your procedure for removal of the item?”
“I think a practical demonstration is called for, if you will follow me, milord.” Unwin led the way out of the office and through a dark wooden door into the narrow hallway. The skylights above were criss-crossed with bars to stop anyone breaking in. Thick opaque glass allowed light to filter through, but no one, not even pigeons, could see inside.
Unwin stopped at a solid metal door with a symmetrical pattern of rivets around the outer edge and through the middle. He rapped three times, paused, and rapped two more times. From the other side came the heavy clunk of a bolt being drawn back, and then the door swung open.
“Mr Unwin. Is everything all right, sir?” A man wearing a thick canvas apron peered through the gap.
“Yes. Lord Wycliff here is asking about our procedure. Carry on—we will observe.” The man retreated and Unwin followed.
Wycliff found himself in an unadorned room with whitewashed walls. A rectangular table on wheels sat in the middle of the room. A trolley by the head would have been ideal for holding tea and sandwiches, except this one held an array of tools and a large basin. Another steel door was directly opposite the one through which they had entered.
“Where does that lead?” he asked Unwin.
“The warehouse where donors arrive and are dispatched a few hours later. Carriages are drawn in and the barn doors rolled shut to give us complete privacy so that coffins are removed from the view of curious eyes.” Unwin grinned as though pleased with the process he and his partner had implemented.
To be fair, they had been in business for two years now with London none the wiser as to the true nature of their operation. Shame a disturbed coffin had shone a light on their activities.
Wycliff returned his attention to the activity within the room. If he altered his vision, would the hound perceive a soul hovering over its mortal form, asking for an explanation for the act committed against it? He chased the thought away. He was here to watch and learn. At least what occurred within the clean room had none of the gore or sharp whiff of the battlefield.
A man lay on the table with a sheet draped over his body and tucked in under his chin. His gruesome and bloody visage appeared as though he had taken a cannon ball straight to the head.
Unwin stood next to him and gestured to the odd death mask. “My workers are most skilled and quick. As you can see, the scalp is cut around the back and peeled forward, leaving it intact at the forehead. They remove the top portion of skull with a small saw.” Here he gestured to a blade sitting on the trolley beside the worker with specks of blood and pale matter embedded in its teeth. “Next the brain is extracted and placed in a container to be catalogued, sliced, and preserved in another room.”
“Then how do you put everything back?” Wycliff asked as the worker picked up another instrument.
Unwin pointed to a clear jar with a pale aqua jelly inside. “We use a special paste to stick the skull back together, and then the scalp is stitched. We ensure there is hardly any visible sign of our work.”
“Would the stitches become dislodged if the coffin were handled roughly?” Part of Wycliff watched with fascination as the worker put his hands into the dead man’s cranium and removed the large pinkish mass from within.
“I find it unlikely that a pallbearer’s stumbling would cause sufficient disruption to Mrs Sennett that the stitches and glue would give out, and the skull be dislodged.” Unwin snorted.
If the skull hadn’t become dislodged by accident, that left only design. Somebody had removed the stitches and loosened the skull, otherwise no one would ever have known when they checked on the corpse. “Who performed the procedure on Mrs Sennett?”
The worker placed the object, which didn’t yet resemble cauliflower, in the wide shallow basin. “That would be Peters, Lord Wycliff.”
“What happens when you finish? Does someone check your work?” From Wycliff’s observations, the business premises resembled a church—quiet and with very few people about.
Unwin huffed and narrowed his gaze. “No one inspects their work. My men are trusted employees.”
Wycliff assumed they ran on as few staff as possible. The more men on the payroll, the more potential leaks the business could spring. Not to mention the extra wages they would have to pay.
The worker gestured to the door behind him. “We wheel the body back through to the warehouse and place it in its coffin. That normally takes two of us. But smaller bodies we can handle on our own.”
If Mrs Sennett had been on the smaller side, a man would have been able to lift her without assistance. “I’ll need to talk to Peters.”
“He’s not here this week.” The man wiped his hands on a cloth hanging from the trolley’s handle before picking up the piece of skull.
“Where is he?” Wycliff glanced from one man to the other.
“Sick, apparently. Been absent for three days now.” The worker dipped a brush in the aqua jelly, then he applied it to the edges of the piece he held.
Unwin scowled. “We prefer our men to stay away if they are unwell, but I will not pay Peters for missing so many days. I can send one of the men to check on him.”
A familiar niggle took up residence in Wycliff’s mind. The itch that said he was on the trail of a scent. “Give me his address and I will call upon him.”
They left the worker to stitch the man’s scalp back into place and returned to the office. The put-upon secretary looked up Peters’ employment details and then wrote down his address. Wycliff tucked the card into his coat pocket and took his leave to return to the Ministry’s offices.
There, he found Hannah had taken a new task upon herself, namely calling upon Mrs Hamilton about her missing cousin. He took a cab to the address but decided against entering the house. His last visit there had not gone so well. Wycliff stood by the carriage and waited for Hannah to emerge. She walked toward him with tears shining in her eyes that answered one question on his mental list.
“Our remains are all that is left of the former Lady Albright?” He opened the carriage door and helped Hannah inside.
“Yes,” she whispered.
“The Ministry of Unnaturals,” he said to Old Jim, then hopped inside and slammed the door.
He sat beside his wife in silence and waited for her to continue. With the identity of the victim confirmed, at least the sexton wouldn’t need to check every grave in Bunhill Fields.
“Four days ago, the former Lady Albright went to visit the cemetery. She clutched a bunch of orange snapdragons and wore a black gown with feathers embroidered around the hem and embellished with black beads. She also had a gold tooth in the same spot as the jaw we found and was short of stature.” Hannah let out a heavy sob.
Wycliff pulled her against his chest and hoped his presence gave her some solace. The carriage rumbled along the road and drifts of shouted conversation from pedestrians filled the silence.
Hannah tilted her face to look up at him. “She did not deserve such an end. She suffered so much at the hands of her husband. Who could possibly have hated her enough to consign her to flames?”
His grip tightened on her. Once, he had thought all the Afflicted should be thrown on a pyre. Then Hannah had opened his eyes and his heart. “You have answered your own question. She was an impediment to one man—her husband.”
“Her cousin was quick to make the same accusation. While I agree he is the most likely person to wish the former Lady Albright removed from this earth, I shall play devil’s advocate and ensure we are not blinded to other options. A man should be found guilty by the evidence, not by our opinion of his character.” Hannah took the handkerchief he handed her and dabbed at her eyes.
Wycliff ki
ssed her cheek. “We will seek justice for the former Lady Albright. I shall pay her husband a visit. Now, how did your conversation go with Mr Sennett?”
“As we suspected, when the work of Unwin and Alder was discovered, he pleaded ignorance rather than reveal he had been paid for what happened to his wife’s remains. While it is probably nothing, the circumstances surrounding the discovery of his wife’s condition don’t sit well with me. Mr Sennett said it was her brother, Jimmy Kelly, who tripped and jostled the coffin, though he says it was the smallest bump. Then Mr Kelly was most insistent the coffin be opened to see if they had disturbed his sister. When they prised off the lid, there just happened to be a reporter for the scandal sheets in the vicinity. It strikes me as too coincidental.” A frown appeared between her brows.
They were of one mind on that topic. The whole affair made the itch at the base of Wycliff’s brain flare—the same spot that had warned of an enemy hiding among the trees during the war. “I went to Unwin and Alder earlier today to ask about their procedure. Unwin was adamant that the way the skull and scalp are reattached would hold against any jostling and the woman’s head shouldn’t have come apart.”
“And yet it did. In front of a reporter,” she murmured.
His thoughts followed a similar line. A simple explanation was that the worker, Peters, had not completed his job as required or had made sloppy stitches that pulled apart easily. Then, perhaps realising he was about to be exposed after the newspaper article, he invented a sickness to remove himself from the premises and to escape questions. “The man who worked on Mrs Sennett, name of Peters, has been absent for some days. I shall pay him a call and ask a few questions.”
“While you tackle Lord Albright and Mr Peters, I shall visit Mrs Sennett’s brother, the man who took the unfortunate tumble that precipitated these events,” Hannah said.
The warm, contented feeling in Wycliff’s chest spread. Investigations went more efficiently when they shared the load, and each used their skills to interview those involved. She was the light to his darkness. If only Hannah’s touch could release the good souls trapped on the mortal plane.
8
Old Jim turned the carriage into their drive later that afternoon. Hannah felt drained, yet her mind conjured different scenarios for how the former Lady Albright might have met her fate. She took Wycliff’s arm as they walked up the back stairs. In the rear vestibule, they stopped before the stained glass window depicting a peacock with his tail spread to strip off gloves and hats.
Her father wheeled her mother along toward them.
“Why are you torturing your gloves like that, dear?” Seraphina’s voice cut through Hannah’s dense thoughts.
She looked down to find the soft leather wrung between her hands as though it were laundry. With a sigh, she shook them loose and tossed them to the table in the dappled blue and green light from the window. “The remains are all that is left of the former Lady Albright.”
“No! She is a lost, but gentle soul. What a horrid way to end one’s time on this earth.” Seraphina wheeled herself closer and leaned forward in her chair.
Wycliff stuffed his gloves into his hat but kept hold of it, rapping his nails against the short pile.
Hannah could imagine the outrage flashing in her mother’s eyes at discovering one of the Afflicted had suffered in such a way. She took command of the bathchair and wheeled her mother along the hall to the library. Such conversations as they were about to have needed to be conducted surrounded by soothing books.
Sheba ran ahead and sat on the rug before the fire, Barnes nowhere to be seen for a change.
Sir Hugh shut the door and stood by the sofa. His arms were crossed and his attention on his wife, but he asked his question of Hannah. “You are certain it was she?”
Hannah dropped into a seat and picked up Sheba to hold the spaniel’s comforting warmth in her lap. “As certain as we can be. Mrs Hamilton, the cousin of the former Lady Albright, reported her missing. She was last seen heading to the cemetery as twilight fell some four days ago, wearing a dress with embroidery around the hem that matched the scrap Wycliff found. She also carried a bunch of orange snapdragons and had a gold tooth in the same location as the one in the jawbone downstairs.”
“Who would do such a thing to a harmless woman?” Sir Hugh rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.
“Who indeed?” Wycliff murmured as he took up a position by the fireplace and leaned on the mantel. “One can almost imagine a drunken night at a club and one husband in particular shouting, Will no one rid me of this troublesome wife? To misquote Henry the Second.”
“Lord Albright.” Seraphina spat the words out with such vehemence, the veil puffed away from her face.
“If we were making bets, that is where I would place my money,” Wycliff said.
“I am taking a contrary stance, to ensure we remain objective.” Not that Hannah wanted to defend the horrid man, but any person was presumed innocent until proven guilty. Sheba reached up and licked her face, as though offering her own kind of support.
“As satisfying as it would be to storm his house and drag him out to be tossed on his own pyre, let us ensure we have correctly identified the victim first. It is possible I could detect some trace of the curse in her remains, thus confirming it is one of the Afflicted. Would you take me downstairs, please, Hugh?” Seraphina wheeled herself over to her husband.
Hugh rested his much larger hand over that of his wife. Worry pulled at his eyes as he gazed at the love of his life. “Are you sure you wish to see what little remains of her?”
The mage sat silent for a long minute. “Fire is the only way to put an end to us. If the choice of victim and method are deliberate, rather than opportunistic, that is information Wycliff needs to find the person responsible.”
Hannah shuddered, remembering the nightmare-inducing deaths of the secondary Afflicted she had witnessed on the grounds of the Repository of Forgotten Things. They had been tied to stakes, as though they were witches feared by men. Her mother had cast an enhanced white flame that burned more intensely and ended their suffering quickly.
“There is another issue the identification of the victim raises. She would have to have been restrained in some way. If they targeted the former Lady Albright, this wasn’t a spontaneous crime, but one that required forethought and some preparation.” In Hannah’s mind, the horrible event unfolded.
“Yes. Most methods of rendering a victim unconscious wouldn’t work on one of the Afflicted, with no respiratory system. The attacker needed something that would work on both the living and undead.” Sir Hugh waved his hands in the air as he spoke.
“A spell, most likely. Magic is intertwined with this crime,” Seraphina murmured.
“First things first. Let’s confirm it is one of the Afflicted, if Sera can find any trace left of the curse.” Hugh picked up Seraphina in his arms and Hannah preceded them out the door. Wycliff brought up the rear.
“Stay, Sheba,” Hannah said to the spaniel as she opened the door in the panelling to reveal the dark stairs that led to the basement laboratory.
Barnes appeared, jumping down the main stairs like a frog in a hurry. At the bottom, the hand reached up and tugged on a lock of fur to divert the spaniel’s attention as they slipped through the door. Below the house in the cool laboratory, Hugh settled his wife on a stool while Hannah fetched the wooden box holding all that remained of the woman they believed to be the former Lady Albright.
“Her cousin has asked that she be returned, to give her a final burial,” Hannah said. She placed the box on the table and then stepped to Wycliff’s side. He took her hand and laced their fingers together.
Her father prised off the lid and kept hold of it. Seraphina peered inside and then withdrew the piece of the pelvis. She held the bone in her hands and bowed her head. After some time, she placed it back in the box and rubbed the grit between her gloved fingers. “There is an almost imperceptible trace of dark magic. Like finding a dirty
crumb in a dark room. But it is there, lingering deep in her bone. This was one of my Afflicted sisters and when taken with all the other evidence, confirms it is the former Lady Albright.”
Sir Hugh placed the lid on the box but left it sitting on the table. Hannah would return it to Mrs Hamilton.
“Now, take me to where this atrocity was committed,” Seraphina said.
“That is Bunhill Fields, Mother. Are you sure you wish to go there as twilight falls?” Hannah thought they would make an odd group prowling the paths and graves with a dead mage and a hellhound. Perhaps they should take Barnes and Frank to make it even more disturbing. They might terrify any grave robbers into giving up their criminal ways.
Seraphina waved a hand and then pushed her stool away from the table. “I can think of no better place for a dead thing to be but in a cemetery at dusk.”
Wycliff set off to tell Frank they were heading out again—the man was probably halfway through unharnessing the horses. Sir Hugh carried Seraphina back through the house to her bathchair. Then, they waited by the rear doors that overlooked the barn and forest.
Her mother stared at the smudge on her linen gloves. “I think we require a change of clothing. Cream linen is not appropriate to pay homage to the former Lady Albright. I shall emulate her example while walking this earth.”
The mage sat still for a moment, then she clasped her hands and whispered. Words swirled over Hannah’s skin and raised the familiar prickle. As she watched, the cream linen covering her mother deepened in colour. A murky brown dropped over the fabric as though someone had thrown a pot of tea at it. Then the brown edged toward inky black until she appeared in full mourning. Seraphina worked her hands in the air until a dark flash burst between her outstretched palms and she held a crown of twisted black feathers and gleaming black beads. She set the decoration on her head and declared herself ready.
Hannah shrugged on a warm pelisse and tied her bonnet under her chin as Wycliff trotted up the stairs and claimed his top hat from Mary. Sir Hugh picked up his wife once more so that Frank could tie the bathchair to its spot at the rear of the carriage.
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