Interviewing the Dead

by David Field

  ‘So you’ll do it?’ Carlyle asked eagerly.

  Matthew shrugged. ‘I’ll think about it.’

  ‘He’ll do it,’ Adelaide announced and all eyes turned to her, particularly Matthew’s.

  ‘What makes you so sure of that?’ he demanded.

  ‘Because he’s a man of honour who believes in the public good, however misguided he may be in other ways. Because he can’t resist a challenge. Because he cares. And because I’m asking him.’

  A deathly silence filled the room, during which Matthew’s face reddened to a depth that almost camouflaged the fading purple of the iodine. He swallowed hard, cleared his throat and croaked out his response. ‘Let me know when and where.’

  ‘Well, that seems settled, then,’ Carlyle concluded before Matthew had time to reconsider. ‘John, perhaps we might go and see the commissioner now, if he’s got a moment free. Matthew, can Adelaide drop you off somewhere in the coach?’

  Scarcely able to believe what he’d just heard himself say, Matthew decided that perhaps he should make his peace with his employing Church before launching himself onto a public stage to proclaim the end of the East End terror. He was almost certainly going to be thrown from its ranks anyway and at least he’d get some sort of recognition for his honesty, while leaving himself with a clear conscience.

  ‘Would it be too far for Collins to take me down to Shadwell?’ he asked.

  ‘After he’s dropped me off at the hospital,’ Adelaide insisted. ‘I have some work to do on those formulas we’d begun calculating.’

  ‘Yes, off you go, both of you,’ Carlyle said.

  There was an awkward silence inside the coach until halfway down the Embankment, along the route chosen by the experienced Collins on his journey east, avoiding the clutter of the more northerly route along The Strand and Fleet Street and down through Ludgate Circus.

  ‘I meant that apology,’ Adelaide said awkwardly as she gazed out of the side window at the sluggish Thames.

  ‘I don’t consider you to be a woman who says things she doesn’t mean,’ Matthew replied as he looked the other way, at the historic buildings around the Temple.

  It fell silent again until Matthew spoke. ‘You must think me an awful fool, allowing myself to be duped by that slimy newspaper reporter. I think he was playing my poor sister along.’

  ‘She wouldn’t be the first woman to be fooled by a man,’ Adelaide said coldly.

  Matthew couldn’t resist asking, ‘You, for example?’

  ‘None of your damned business. But as for your being easily duped, you seemed to agree more quickly than I anticipated to my insistence that you make that public appearance. I hope you won’t later accuse me of duping you.’

  ‘“Beguiling” might be a better word,’ Matthew blurted out before he could stop himself. Even with her head averted as she continued to study the Thames he could see the colour rising in Adelaide’s neck and feared another outburst like the one in the laboratory the previous week, so he started to backtrack. ‘Look, when I said “beguiling’ just now, I wasn’t intending to —’

  ‘I know what the word signifies,’ Adelaide replied sharply without turning round. ‘I just hope that you were giving it its proper meaning. After all, you are a clergyman and they’ve been known to talk in tongues.’

  ‘Not this one,’ Matthew assured her, as they passed under Blackfriars Bridge and turned into Upper Thames Street and he realised that this precious time together was almost at an end. ‘Perhaps when all this is over...’

  ‘Perhaps what?’

  ‘I don’t really know — just “perhaps”, I suppose.’

  ‘Well, when you do know, ask again and I’ll consider it. Whatever it is, of course.’

  ‘I will — and thank you.’

  It fell silent again and they reached the hospital all too quickly. Then it was back down Cannon Street and into Cable Street, where Matthew alighted from the coach, thanked Collins and made his way with a sinking heart through the front door of the East End Mission, to the noticeboard on which all those attached to the Mission received internal communications. He found the one he was expecting to find inside an envelope. Since such luxuries were in short supply inside the Mission, he knew it had to be important even before he read the terse message.

  ‘Whenever you deem it appropriate to return, see me before proceeding any further. Samuel Livingstone, Superintendent.’

  ‘I hope that you didn’t apply for the Spitalfields Assistant Ministry,’ Superintendent Livingstone began as Matthew stood before him, head bowed, ‘because if you did I’d be obliged to remove your name from the list and that would be embarrassing for both of us.’

  ‘Actually, I’m here to offer my resignation,’ Matthew mumbled reluctantly.

  Livingstone looked up sharply. ‘I shall oppose that also, but what were you thinking, man?’

  ‘I was only doing what I thought best,’ Matthew explained.

  Livingstone shook his head in disbelief. ‘Best for who, exactly? Certainly not for our image as a church of God. It was bad enough that you attracted the police down here, then got yourself arrested for murder after killing a man in a street brawl. And don’t assure me that you were only acting in self-defence, because I’ve heard that a dozen times from those making use of our little sanctuary here who’ve been queuing up to plead with me not to dismiss you from our team. You would seem to have a certain following in here, which is probably why I’m not asking for your resignation. But please explain this if you can!’

  Mathew groaned as Livingstone threw a copy of the Herald down on the table between them, with Tim Washbourne’s ‘exclusive’ front page story face up and sat back with both eyebrows raised in enquiry.

  Matthew swallowed hard and began to explain. ‘I was ambushed — waylaid — duped — call it what you will. I said nothing to that dreadful little rat Washbourne about devils, Satan, “Fiends” or anything else.’

  ‘But he must have found some way of getting you to at least talk to him — or did he break into your house and hold you captive?’

  ‘No, that was my stupid starry-eyed sister, who dreams of becoming a newspaper illustrator. This creepy little man offered her the opportunity to get her artwork into his story if she could persuade me to speak with him.’

  ‘I must admit that the depiction of you in the illustration is perhaps the best part of the whole miserable business — although you were obviously not authorised to pose as a fully-fledged Minister and certainly not one who appeared to have recently converted to Catholicism!’

  ‘My sister’s artistic licence, I’m afraid,’ Matthew explained with a crestfallen expression. ‘The picture’s about as bad an invention as the story.’

  ‘So I have your word as a man of God that you never, at any time, portrayed yourself as a slayer of demons?’

  ‘Of course not! I just told him that I was attacked by a lunatic — as indeed I was — and he allowed his lurid imagination to invent the rest. I demanded that he refrain from publishing even the little bit that I’d confided in him — just before I offered to throw him down the stairs.’

  ‘And that would hardly have been good for our image either,’ Livingstone pointed out. ‘However, given the high regard that our humble congregation appears to still have for you, which is of course what really matters, we’ll regard this simply as a formal warning. I meant what I said about not applying for the Spitalfields vacancy, but otherwise we’ll return to normal. But this is the third warning I’ve been obliged to issue and there will not be a fourth. Very well, off you go to your Bible class, assuming that you don’t have a prior appointment to do battle with Satan himself.’

  When Matthew appeared not to be departing with his tail between his legs, Livingstone looked back up enquiringly. ‘Well?’

  ‘There’s something else,’ Matthew replied in a voice hoarse with nervous anticipation. He might as well tell the truth, get it over with now and collect his few possessions from his shelf in the communal cu
pboard in the tea room.

  ‘What else? Surely you can’t still be pursuing this disgraceful policy of self-promotion?’

  ‘Of course not, Superintendent. It’s just that — well...’

  ‘Well what?’

  ‘Do you not think that the people of the East End are entitled to reassurance that these recent incidents are not the work of the Devil, or incarnate spirits come back from the grave?’

  ‘Even assuming that you can give them such a reassurance, do you not think that you owe it to the Church of which you are a member to simply advise them to trust in God and foreswear any evil that might endanger their souls?’

  ‘Perhaps, but — well, I’ve been offered the opportunity to set their minds at rest and to be part of a process that will reveal to the entire citizenry of the East End that these recent horrors were a wicked trick instigated by a black-hearted villain for criminal purposes of his own.’

  ‘You’re beginning to sound as melodramatic and shallow as that dreadful newspaper hack. What exactly have you got in mind?’

  ‘A public meeting.’

  ‘Of what nature and with what purpose, precisely?’

  ‘Well, there’s this surgeon at the London Hospital, who’s been working with an Inspector from Scotland Yard and they’ve discovered that all those poor souls who thought they’d seen a returning corpse from the plague pit had actually been drugged. A new drug, apparently and one that’s recently come into London on a ship from America. Anyway, it was being slipped into the beer of each selected victim, so it wasn’t evil entities after all — just a cheap trick involving a drug that makes people see what they expect to see.’

  ‘And what precisely was your part in this investigation?’

  ‘I didn’t have any part in it, really,’ Matthew explained modestly. ‘I just happened to notice a few things and the surgeon and the inspector managed to work with those and come up with the answer to all these recent events.’

  ‘So after playing the part of a demon slayer, you now propose to set yourself up as a police investigator who has access to drugs brought in through the docks — is that what you’re telling me?’

  ‘Well, not exactly. You see —’

  ‘The answer’s no,’ Livingstone all but growled. When Matthew simply stood there, looking back at his superintendent with eyebrows raised either in disbelief or challenge — it was impossible to tell which — Livingstone opted to leave Matthew in no doubt. ‘If I discover that you’ve loaned the good name of the Wesleyan movement to police drug investigations, you definitely will not have any place here. Do I make myself clear?’

  ‘But —’

  ‘Do I, or do I not, make myself clear?’

  ‘Yes, Superintendent.’

  ‘Very well. Now go about your duties before I change my mind about the third warning.’

  17

  ‘Well at least the family business has benefited from your recent notoriety,’ George West said as he walked into the sitting room where Matthew was gloomily considering his options. There was a single sheet of paper in his hand and he passed it across to Matthew. ‘There’s the first galley proof,’ he added, ‘and we’ve got an order for two hundred, to be delivered to that surgeon bloke who picked you up in his coach the other day. Can your mother and I come along to hear you? And Charles seems to think it might be entertaining, while Caroline wants to bring along her young man from the Herald.’

  With a sinking heart Matthew took the sheet from him and read it.

  THE PLAGUE PIT TRUTH REVEALED!

  You are invited to a public address on the truth behind the recent spate of so-called emanations of evil entities from the Aldgate Plague Pit, to be held in the Assembly Rooms, Leman Street, Whitechapel, at 7 pm sharp on Saturday 10 December.

  The meeting will be addressed by Wesleyan clergyman Matthew West, whose selfless ministry in those East End communities most affected by recent events was underlined in the past week by the attack on him by a demented passer-by who resented his brave attempt to reveal to his frightened flock the true nature of demonic possession and the precise cause of recent tragic events allegedly involving malevolent entities returning from the dead.

  Seats strictly limited in number. Arrive early in order to avoid disappointment. This will be the most exciting revelation of the decade! Refreshments will be available free of charge.

  ‘Quite the celebrity!’ Charles goaded him from the safety of the seat furthest away from Matthew in the sitting room. ‘Will I have to make an appointment with your theatrical agent in order to speak with you in future?’

  ‘You might be making a medical appointment to remove my boot from your backside, if you carry on in that vein,’ Matthew warned him. ‘But talking of medical matters, my surgeon friend from the London Hospital has a daughter who’s planning to stand for a seat on the London County Council.’

  Charles giggled. ‘You’d make a lousy book editor, Matthew. How can one “stand” for a “seat”?’

  ‘That’s how it’s described, officially,’ Matthew explained. ‘But she requires a nominee.’

  ‘More likely she requires a miracle,’ Charles sneered.

  ‘Well, she’s got one already,’ Matthew replied. ‘Me.’

  Charles looked at him enquiringly. ‘Caroline was right, wasn’t she? You do have a new lady friend.’

  ‘Nothing like that,’ Matthew assured him. ‘She’s the daughter of my surgeon friend, that’s all. She was the one who painted my face purple, as a matter of fact — hardly a good start to a romantic relationship.’

  ‘So you want me to nominate, for public office, someone who doesn’t stand the chance of a snowflake in a furnace and someone who I haven’t even met yet, just because she’s caught your eye?’

  ‘She hasn’t caught my eye,’ Matthew persevered. ‘She happens to be campaigning for a worthy cause.’

  ‘Votes for women — that type of thing?’

  ‘No. She believes that women’s voices should be heard more in public affairs, that’s all. That and the fact that they’re worthy of being admitted to the professions.’

  ‘Like yours, for example? How would your employers take to that idea — dollies in dog collars? Corsets under cassocks? Prayers and petticoats?’

  ‘I’m serious and so is she.’

  ‘About each other?’

  ‘Very well, forget I ever asked,’ Matthew grumbled as he turned away to gesture to their father, who was clearly enjoying this exchange. ‘Take this trivial idiot away and get some work out of him for once,’ he requested.

  ‘I didn’t say I wouldn’t,’ Charles reminded him.

  ‘I don’t recall you saying you would, either.’

  ‘I’d need to meet here first, that’s all. Bring her over for tea or something.’

  ‘I’m not sure she’s all that sociably inclined,’ Matthew objected, to a snort from his father.

  ‘If she wants people to vote for her, she’ll need to learn, then. Come on, Charles — we’ve got a living to earn.’

  ‘Fortunately for you, I will be available on the evening of the tenth!’ Matthew announced in a voice raised in anger as he entered the mortuary without knocking.

  ‘That’s what we thought,’ Carlyle said, looking up at him from above the inside of the corpse that he was investigating, while Adelaide regarded him with a cool smirk.

  ‘At least you didn’t attempt to damage the door this time. As for the choice of a Saturday, we took into account the fact that you “holier than thou” types only work one day a week and that’s a Sunday.’

  ‘I suppose I should thank you for giving my father the printing work, but don’t you think you might have given me some warning of your intentions?’

  ‘We did, did we not?’ Carlyle asked. ‘And I distinctly recall you agreeing to participate.’

  ‘“Participate”, certainly,’ Matthew fired back, far from mollified. ‘But you’ve made me the star turn. There’s no mention of you and Inspector Jennings.’

&
nbsp; ‘We’ll make our contributions as and when required. But it’s you they’ll be coming to hear. “The man who slew the Fiend from Hell”. The local dragon-slayer. The peoples’ champion.’

  ‘Saint Matthew and a choir of angels,’ Adelaide added with a further smirk.

  Matthew glared back at her and demanded, ‘Will you be expecting me to supply the refreshments as well?’

  ‘No, that’s Adelaide’s main task,’ Carlyle added hastily, but Matthew was far from finished.

  ‘We haven’t agreed on what I’m supposed to tell them.’

  ‘And that’s your main task,’ Carlyle told him. ‘But it would suit our agenda if you could make mention of some famous incident in the past — preferably here in London — in which a ghost allegedly made an appearance, but turned out to be anything but a ghost. I suggest that you avoid the grisly spectre of Anne Boleyn patrolling Tower Green with her head underneath her arm, because it’s too well known and some people actually believe in it. But something to do with the Tower would be ideal.’

  ‘And what else do you suggest?’

  ‘Use your skills as a preacher to persuade them that there are no such things as ghosts.’

  ‘That’s hardly an original argument and even less likely to persuade people than many other such claims in the past. Can’t we just tell them that those who thought they’d seen something were drugged?’

  ‘I thought we might leave that aspect of the matter to Inspector Jennings — if it comes up, of course,’ Carlyle added hastily.

  Matthew suddenly realised the utter hopelessness of the task for which he’d volunteered. ‘I rather think that you’re in danger of overestimating my powers of oratory. I’m a simple Wesleyan street preacher, not the Pope!’

  ‘Well, it had better be good,’ Carlyle told him, ‘since we’re inviting representatives from all the London newspapers, not to mention a few leading provincial ones as well.’

  Matthew groaned. ‘That’s something else. My superintendent has threatened me with dismissal from the Mission if I attract any more publicity to myself.’