Silent Witnesses

by Annelie Wendeberg

  ‘I know. And I was glad of it. I wouldn’t have wanted to save his life.’

  I watched as his eyes lost focus. He opened his mouth, then shut it and turned away.

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  He frowned at his hands. ‘I keep wondering what death might be like. Have you ever had a patient who…woke up? After you thought they were dead?’

  I shook my head. ‘No, but I saw Death once. My own. She was not at all terrifying.’ I huffed a bitter smile. Why was this memory coming back now? Hadn’t I buried it deep, with the others? ‘But dying… I don’t know how it would feel. Perhaps to some, it might feel like falling asleep after a long struggle. To others… To others, it would be their worst nightmare. I didn’t want to leave my daughter. Everything — everything — in me revolted at that thought when Haywood…’ My voice faltered with a croak.

  ‘Your courage is…’ McCurley said softly, but did not continue.

  I took a sip of the honeyed fennel tea Margery had prepared for me in large quantities. ‘To answer your question with a question: What did your death feel like before you were born?’

  Surprised, he gazed up. ‘I never looked at it from that angle.’

  ‘When did you become alive? Or rather, aware? Was it not…a process more than just a sudden spark? So perhaps, death is not the sudden snuffing of that spark, but more of a…process itself. A fading from this life to whatever comes next.’

  Shutting his eyes, he leant back in his chair. Something was glinting in his lashes. ‘Do you believe there is an…after?’ His voice was husky.

  I was about to say no. But then I couldn’t help wondering if that was how his grief might abate — with forgiveness, and the hope that his wife might have found peace.

  ‘I don’t know. I think it’s not for me to know if or what comes after I die. Because it would distract me from trying to make the best of the life I’m living.’

  The sky blackened. Silently, Klara sneaked up on the porch, climbed into my lap, and nestled her face against my chest.

  END

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  of the next book in the series

  River of Bones

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  Prologue

  Boston, September 1893

  Had Mr Wilbur known that his two Dachshunds would resurrect a corpse, he certainly wouldn’t have taken them for a walk.

  He would have stayed in bed.

  It was a crisp Sunday morning when Mr Wilbur strolled down Middlesex Avenue and into the marshes of Mystic River. The grass stood high. Dew was rubbing off on his new trousers, moisture creeping through cotton, weighing them down. He should have taken the time to put on his wellingtons, he told himself. Or his gaiters, at the very least.

  A thin sheet of fog hovered above the water, tickled by rays of sunlight. Mr Wilbur thought of fairies. He shook his head. Ridiculous. He turned, his eyes searching for his dogs. Their sleek bodies were hidden by the grass, their tails pointing straight up, flicking like whips. When they began yipping in excitement, he wondered what they’d found. He would have to ask the maid to wash them upon his return — they were surely rolling in something revolting.

  The yipping grew more frantic as Mr Wilbur stepped out onto the bank. He regretted the move instantly as his shoes sank into the soft mud. With a curse, he took two steps back, and skidded his mucky soles over clumps of grass. Then he lifted his head to call his dogs back.

  And paused.

  There was a big lump lying on the bank, fifteen yards or so away. The dogs were doing…what precisely? Tugging at something? Eating it? What was it, anyway? He narrowed his eyes. It was large. As large as a fat man. Shaped like one, too. No, that was impossible.

  He would make an appointment with his ophthalmologist. Yes, right away. No, it was Sunday. That would have to wait until tomorrow.

  Mr Wilbur lifted his fingers to his mouth and whistled. The dogs didn’t even look up. They were entirely focused on…whatever that thing was.

  He felt anger roll in his belly. Disobedience would not be toler—

  A sharp, aggressive bark — like a small cannon shot. The dogs scattered like fleas.

  The lump gave a violent twitch.

  A wail cut through the fog.

  * * *

  The Boston Post, Tuesday, September 5, 1893

  CORONER’S NOTICE - Body of a man found two days ago at Mystic River near Middlesex Avenue, Somerville: about 45 years old, 5 feet 9 inches in height, stout build, dark hair, smooth face; had on Kentucky jean pants, brown vest, light calico shirt, blue cotton socks, and congress gaiters. Body at City Morgue for identification. Henry Millers, M.D. & Jacob Rubenstein, Coroners.

  * * *

  By midsummer 1893, the recession had begun to grind people down. The census reported surging unemployment rates, and panic was beginning to stir among the working class. Housing prices notched up every other week, and the slums grew more and more crowded.

  During that time of economic upheaval, only three things kept Margery from fearing the four of us would surely fall into poverty: her ability to preserve nearly everything she found at the farmer’s market, a rather extensive root cellar for storing unfathomable amounts of food for months (never mind that this wasn’t a root cellar at all, but a tunnel and secret escape route), and my inheritance that was mostly in gold.

  I had told Margery and Zachary that I had inherited more than seventy thousand dollars, which they trusted would be enough for a lifetime. Had I told them the truth of it, Margery would have fallen over in shock.

  Now, with autumn approaching, Margery, Zach, and Klara were going to the market almost daily. They would set out after breakfast and return before lunch, their small handcart laden with whatever was being sold at the best price that day. Then they’d sort their loot in the kitchen. Our tunnel was equipped with two rows of shelves down its considerable length, holding jars of fruits, jams, tomatoes, applesauce, artichokes, casks of sauerkraut and pickles, and even wheels of cheese sealed with cotton cloth and butter. Come winter, our larder would be stocked with ham, bacon, smoked sausages, crocks of lard, and other delicacies.

  Margery seemed to be preparing for war. Or the apocalypse.

  When the others went to market, I would make my way to Wards Six and Seven. It was a world of stink, grime, rats, dead goats, and drunkards. For that stink, I’d quit my lecturing post at the medical school for women. I’d closed my practice for these drunkards. And I hadn’t been happier in years.

  If anyone had asked what had compelled this choice, I’m not sure I would have found a satisfying answer. Slum life isn’t pretty; everyone knows that. But what I found nearly impossible to stomach were the countless drunken children and babies.

  In the slums, alcohol makes life bearable. In stale beer dives, the dregs from old casks were gathered and rounds of beer were sold at two cents. The recession hadn’t changed that in the least, and the slum dwellers kept on drinking savagely. To them, alcohol was an anaesthetic. It lifted any and all inhibitions. It wiped away worries. Consequences no longer existed. People coupled, made babies. Pregnancies were a mere afterthought. Births happened nearly accidentally for mothers so stone drunk they didn’t even feel the contractions. If both mother and child survived, the father or one of the older siblings would often wrap up the newcomer in some dirty rag to dump it in a park or an alleyway, or on the doorstep of some fashionable house.

  Most of those babies ended up in squalid almshouses, with paupers, drunks, and the insane for company. They slept and cried and shat in small cardboard boxes lined with cotton wool, their lifespans measured in days.

  My daughter seemed to have inherited my impulse to try to fix hopeless situations. She kept bringing home dying animals. Songbirds and their chicks that she’d wrenched from the maw of a cat, horribly chewed up but still twitching. Sickly kittens that were only skin and bone, and much too small to survive without their mother. And once, a small dog that must have been purp
osely set on fire. They all died. It was heartbreaking to watch Klara trying her best, and failing. I did all I could to help her care for them, but she needed to understand that sometimes, all one could do was to make a passing more bearable.

  She had a thousand questions, but asked none of them. She rarely spoke a word.

  Margery couldn’t fathom why I frequented Boston’s worst slums, why I wanted to help the dregs, the ignorant, the shiftless. Zach, though, understood without me ever needing to explain.

  Once you open your eyes to the suffering around you, it’s nearly impossible to ever shut them again.

  But one day, my trip to the slums was forestalled by a knock at the front door.

  ‘Good day, Dr Arlington.’ Inspector McCurley ripped off his hat, and straightened his mop of unruly hair with several impatient flicks of his hand.

  It took me a moment to process his appearance. I hadn’t seen him for three months. Not since shortly after he and I killed Haywood — the man who had murdered three women and was known as the Railway Strangler.

  McCurley looked healthier. Happier. A light shone in his blue eyes that hadn’t been there before.

  ‘Is your daughter well?’ I asked.

  He smiled broadly. ‘She’s crawling.’ And then his eyes flared with a mix of pride and fear. ‘She’s horrifyingly fast.’

  I chuckled. ‘Ha! Wait until she starts walking. That is most terrifying. They wobble around on chubby legs and their huge head seems to take aim at every pointy bit of furniture nearby.’

  His shoulders dropped. I regretted my words a little. As a police inspector, he must have seen enough blood and gore to know how a toddler with a head wound would look.

  Clearing his throat, he pushed his hands into his pockets. ‘I’ve come to ask a favour. For your help, really. You’ll be paid for your time, of course…’ He trailed off, glanced over my shoulder and spotted Klara, who was getting ready to leave with Zach and Margery. ‘She has grown so much.’

  ‘Sometimes I could swear she grows half an inch overnight. Why don’t you come in, Inspector?’ I said, stepping aside.

  We walked toward the sitting room, but he said, ‘I’d like to talk to you in private. In your office, perhaps?’

  ‘Of course.’ Steering us into my office, I wondered what he might want.

  He shut the door, and cleared his throat. ‘Early this morning, a body was found on the bank of Mystic River in Somerville.’

  I propped my hip against the edge of my desk. ‘And you’ve been assigned the case, which allows only one conclusion.’

  He inclined his head. ‘First evidence points to homicide. An autopsy is scheduled for…’ He looked around the room, then pulled a watch from his pocket. ‘An hour and a half from now. But that’s not why I’m calling on you. A boy was found huddled with the corpse. Maybe six or seven years old — we’re not sure. He’s malnourished. Skittish as a cornered rabbit. The police surgeon described him as disturbed and unresponsive.’

  ‘He examined the boy?’

  ‘Well…from a distance. More or less. The boy wouldn’t let the man touch him. He began screaming when the surgeon tried to pull him up. It was the strangest sound. Like a tortured animal.’ McCurley shrugged helplessly. ‘He’s covered in grime and reeks of decomposition.’

  ‘Did he say anything?’

  ‘Not a word.’

  * * *

  CONTINUE READING

  More…

  Victorian Mysteries:

  Find all my books here:

  www.anneliewendeberg.com

  Acknowledgments

  This is to the lovely crowd over at Silent-Witnesses.com who have supported the making of this book:

  Gloria Horton-Young, Heather Lopez, Lou Valentine, Therese Webster, A. Zecha, Linda Koch, Carrie Pandya, Linda Koch, Steve Howard, Sandra Stehr, Gudrun Thäter, Michael Morrison, Rich Lovin, Caroline Wolfram, Kim Wright, and Victoria Dillman.

  And to my beta readers Kim Wright, Sabrina Flynn, and Rich Lovin, and my proofreader Tom Welch.

  THANK YOU ALL!

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  A quick note on the jokes Warren tells in chapter twenty-one: Yes! That's real Victorian humour found in 1890s newspapers.

  The gherkin joke is from this century, my absolute favourite and the only one I am ever able to remember. Need I mention that I'm the only one who finds it hilariously funny? So you see, the author has inserted herself into her character. Tsk!

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  To get your daily dose of Victorian curiosities, sign up with my Book Club over on Facebook (no gherkin jokes there, I promise).