The anatomists, p.2
The Anatomists, page 2
Together, we rolled our gentleman over onto his face. Jean-Claude lifted the man’s hair and peered closely at the back of his neck. “A torch!” he commanded. “Tout de suite!” I reached for the brightest flame on the wall and illuminated the area that had so captivated my friend’s attention. “Exactly as I thought,” he said, with a hint of smug satisfaction in his voice. “Do you see now?”
I started to take exception to his emphasis on the word “now,” but before I could formulate a proper defense, I did see. At the base of the dead man’s skull, in the very center, was a small, perfectly round and perfectly lethal-looking hole. “This man has been murdered,” Jean-Claude solemnly pronounced.
“Murdered?” I replied, sorely taken aback. “How can that be? I read nothing of a murder in the newspaper. And surely if a gentleman such as this had been murdered…”
“Do you really not see, my friend? How could the murder have been in the newspaper, when you and I are the first to know of it?”
“What do you mean?” I said, giving up all pretense of following his logic. “A gentleman such as this is stabbed to death, and no one takes notice? I know the wound is somewhat out of the way, but we found it. And surely someone else would have bothered to take a look. The man’s wife, for example. Or the men he was playing cards with, if that’s what he was doing. Or the undertaker, for heaven’s sake.”
“Do I have to draw you a picture?” he said, grasping his own hair by the roots—a gesture, by the way, with which I was to become extremely familiar over the next few years. “There was no undertaker, for this man was never taken under! He was never buried. He did not come into our hands from the ground. He came to us directly from the street.”
“But who…?”
Jean-Claude did not even allow me to finish my question. “I very much fear that the agent of delivery in this case, was also the agent of death.”
“You mean that lad…what was his name.”
“Jimmy, I believe it was. Précisément.”
“My God,” I gasped. “But whatever for?”
“Why, for money,” he explained. “Four guineas for a gentleman’s life.” Jean-Claude paused for a moment, reflectively, and then continued. “It is not without precedent. Someone relies upon the trade of fresh bodies to make a living. The graveyards supply the fruits of his trade, but sometimes the harvest is scarce. The money runs out, and he must find his bodies somewhere else. In desperate situations, he seeks his dead among the living.”
“So you think that boy…Jimmy…?”
“I think that if he killed this man, it shall go hard with him. But there is only one way to know for certain. We must go directly to the source. And if he has not ventured back out into the night, I believe we will find him at…what was it? Ah yes, at the Jolly Fox. Come, my friend.”
For the second time that night, we ventured out onto the streets. This time, however, since it was illumination we sought rather than cover of darkness, we carried a lantern, and thus made far greater haste than we had on our first such journey. In less than half an hour, we arrived at our disreputable-looking destination, where we found the handcart still parked out front.
The scene that greeted us upon opening the door reminded one of something from the deeper circles of Dante’s Inferno. Smoke hung heavily in the air, dimming the already feeble light thrown off by a few dirty lanterns. Men and women from the very lowest rung of society’s ladder lounged about the place in various postures of dissolution, eating greasy food and drinking stale beer and cheap gin. My stomach turned within me, and every fiber of my being screamed to be released back into the fresh night air. Jean-Claude, however, appeared totally impervious to the noxious atmosphere and merely searched the smoky enclosure until his eyes came to rest upon Jimmy, leaning casually against the bar, drinking a tankard of beer and laughing over some story the barkeep had just related. What a depraved specimen of humanity, I thought to myself, to have such a light heart after executing such a dark deed.
While I stood transfixed to the spot, I saw Jean-Claude stroll resolutely toward the lad and engage him in conversation. As they spoke, I watched the levity flee from Jimmy’s face, to be replaced by a gravity that bespoke a full awareness of the import of what my friend was saying to him. After a few moments of such deep discussion, Jimmy set his mug upon the bar and followed Jean-Claude across the room and toward the front door, leaving me alone in the tavern until I hastened to join them outside.
As I approached the two in the quiet darkness outside, I heard Jimmy vociferously protesting his innocence. “I’m tellin’ you, Cap’n, I never laid eyes on ’im before I dug ’im up. And ’e was just as dead then as ’e is right now.”
Jean-Claude’s childhood in a police officer’s home showed very clearly now, as he pressed his suspect for a full disclosure of the truth. “It is very simple then,” he said calmly but pointedly. “If it is as you say, then you should be able to take us to the empty grave. If you cannot, however, show us the grave, we will have no choice but to conclude that the body came, not from the ground, but from the street. And as dead men do not, as a custom, walk the streets, we will have no choice but to conclude that he was not dead until you encountered him. And as such lethal encounters are not permitted by the law, we will have no choice but to turn you over to the authorities.”
I could not help shuddering a bit at the cold calculation of my friend’s treatment of the lad, but the chilly inquisition produced an instantaneous result in his auditor. “I’ll show you!” Jimmy said, with a desperate earnestness. “It’s not ’alf a mile from ’ere, the graveyard—right beside the All Souls Church. Just give me a minute to grab me shovel.”
“You may, as you say, ‘grab’ your shovel,” Jean-Claude said sternly. “But we shall accompany you in your grabbing.” It turns out we did not have to accompany him far, because the shovel was lying in his handcart.
Thus supplied with the means for unearthing the truth, whatever that truth might have been, the three of us set out into the dark streets in the direction of All Souls Church, or more accurately, toward the cemetery immediately thereby. Our journey could not have lasted more than ten minutes, but it provided ample time for reflection on the nature of our current dark purpose. The evening had begun strangely enough—with Jean-Claude and me heading out into the streets of London to purchase a dead body from a resurrectionist—but here we were now, scarcely two hours after that first expedition, traipsing to a cemetery to dig up a grave! Truly a macabre twist to an evening that was already the stuff of nightmares.
When we arrived at the side gate to the cemetery, Jimmy shuttered the lantern to permit a mere sliver of light to escape. “The night watchman,” he whispered, explaining his precaution. “He didn’t see me the first time tonight, and I don’t fancy ’im seeing me this time.”
We followed our guide through a gap in the fence where some ironwork was missing—whether by natural or human agency, I had my own opinions. Picking our way among the graves, and barking our shins on more than one headstone, we finally came to a stop at an unmarked, freshly dug patch of earth. “This is the one,” Jimmy whispered. “Now you gentl’men listen out for any noise that ain’t one of the three of us, while I get busy.”
Without further prologue, Jimmy began quietly and expertly moving aside the freshly dug earth. As quickly as he worked, however, the prospect of being accosted by the night watchman made Jimmy’s progress seem unbearably slow. Jean-Claude and I both batted our eyes into the darkness and strained our ears for anything out of the ordinary—out of the ordinary for a graveyard at midnight, that is—until suddenly Jean-Claude exhaled an nervously energetic “Ah!” and left my side. In the dim lanternlight, he had spied a shovel propped against a nearby tombstone and, wasting no time in taking advantage of the opportunity to hasten this unbearable process along, joined Jimmy in the rapidly deepening hole to make quicker work of the job. Visibly relieved to be doing something rather than nothing, Jean-Claude could not resist an attempt at humor. Grasping a large clod of mold from the pile at his feet, he addressed it, “Alas poor Yorick.” I, for one, was not amused.
Finally, after what seemed an eternity of waiting, we heard the resounding and unmistakable thud of metal upon hollow wood. Jean-Claude’s shovel had struck the coffin lid. I joined the two of them in the hole, and we all three worked rapidly, removing the remaining earth until we had cleared a space around the coffin lid. Jimmy and I worked our fingers down through the loosened earth, trying to get a purchase on the lid, while Jean-Claude held the lantern directly above our heads. “The proverbial moment of truth,” he said, moving his gaze back and forth between Jimmy and me, very much like a cardplayer trying to determine whether or not his opponent’s wager is a bluff.
And then, finding the seam for which we were searching, we lifted the lid and tossed it onto the scattered mold beside the open grave. As Jean-Claude lowered the lantern into the hole, my hands quivered, both out of fatigue from the past half hour’s strenuous exertion and from nervous anticipation as I considered the possibly lethal consequences of this project for the young lad standing between us. I shifted, to move my shadow from in front of the lantern, and the beam of light fell starkly upon the interior of the open coffin in which we beheld…absolutely nothing! The grave was, indeed, empty!
“Well, my young friend,” Jean-Claude addressed Jimmy, visibly relieved at the outcome of our search, “it appears you have escaped the gallows. Nevertheless, you would perhaps be well advised to seek for yourself another occupation—one that does not involve dead people.”
Jimmy, clearly relieved at having escaped the cloud of suspicion that had hung about his neck, but also feeling somewhat smug, in spite of himself, at having thus been proven “right,” stroked his fuzzy chin for a moment, then ruminated, “Funny you should mention a change of career, ’cause I’ve been looking about me of late, you know, considering me options. Would you gentl’men happen to know of some respectful employment for an industrious fellow such as myself?”
Jean-Claude stole a quick glance at me, and even in the dim lamplight I could see an amused twinkle playing about his eyes. “Hmm,” he pondered, with feigned gravity. “Perhaps we could find some situation. It would depend upon the skills you have to offer and the type of experience you have had.”
Jimmy’s face lit up. “I’m quite a hand at diggin’, as you gentl’men can attest to. And it ain’t just graves, neither. You tell me something what needs to be dug up, and I’ll have it done before the words are out of your mouth good.”
Two or three times during the course of this tête-à-tête, I thought I heard the crunch of leaves, as if underfoot, but I couldn’t be sure until the distinct snapping of a twig shattered the black stillness just outside our tiny circle of light. My suspicions were confirmed by the instantaneous cessation of conversation between my two companions. “I believe it would be a very good idea if we very quickly and very quietly vacated the premises,” I whispered, as calmly as possible.
“We can’t go now,” Jimmy said incredulously, “without we fill in this hole we just dug up. That’s one of the—what d’you call it?—nonnegotiative rules of my profession. You don’t leave no evidence behind, and no one’s the wiser, if you know what I mean.”
“Honor among thieves,” I heard Jean-Claude mutter under his breath. “As much as I respect a professional man’s ‘rules,’ Jimmy,” he continued, more audibly, “I am afraid my friend is correct in urging our immediate departure from this place. Unless, of course, you fancy spending the night in jail.”
Jimmy opened his mouth—to protest, no doubt—but before he could utter the first syllable, the night’s stillness was shattered by a gruff, troll-like voice, and this voice was not whispering. “Stop right where you are, and don’t move a muscle,” the voice growled. And for a moment, we did exactly as we were commanded, being essentially blind beyond a distance of five feet, and thus completely ignorant of the strength of our new foe.
“It’s the night watchman,” Jimmy whispered.
“I gathered as much,” replied Jean-Claude, in a fully audible voice. “And as for whispering, I think there is no longer the need for it. We have already been discovered.”
“What shall we do?” said I, admittedly at a complete loss for ideas.
“The only thing we can do under the circumstances,” Jean-Claude said, with a tone of resignation totally alien to his character.
“You mean just give up?” I said in utter disbelief. “Just let ourselves—two gentlemen—be arrested…for grave robbing?! We’ll never live it down, Jean-Claude!”
“My friend,” he returned, in a low whisper once more, “I have no more desire than you to be arrested. I also have no intention of being arrested.”
“But…” said I, with a sense of helpless ignorance that was to become familiar to me in such situations, for try as I might to keep up, Jean-Claude always seemed to be one step ahead of me.
“We shall recruit the darkness to be our ally,” he whispered, unnecessarily cryptically, to my way of thinking, until he explained. “The lamp you have in your hand…Keep it shuttered until our foe comes within two arm’s lengths of us. When he is clearly visible, throw open the shutter toward his face, then just as suddenly close it again. He will be momentarily blinded, and we will seize that brief opportunity to escape. Jimmy will lead the way, since he is accustomed to navigating graveyards in the dark.”
“Stay put now, or I’ll shoot you where you stand!” the voice barked from the darkness.
“He is clearly armed, my friends,” pronounced Jean-Claude, at a normal volume once again. “We have no choice but to stand here and wait.”
From the darkness, we could hear the footsteps moving closer and closer for what seemed an hour, as our eyes strained to catch a glimpse of his. Finally, the faintest outline of a human form materialized, and then our would-be captor stepped into the small circle of light. His appearance was exactly consistent with the sound of his voice, for he looked very much like a troll—rude and unkempt, as if he spent his entire life out of doors. Cradled in his dirt-caked hands was an antiquated-looking musket, which he waved vaguely in our general direction.
“He can’t do nothin’ with that old thing,” Jimmy whispered out of the side of his mouth, in a tone of amusement.
“I am not willing to wager my life upon appearances,” Jean-Claude replied audibly. “We had better do as he says.” But under his breath, he muttered, “Wait until I give you the signal,” and when our would-be captor was quite literally close enough to smell, shouted, “Now!”
I opened the shutter as I had been instructed, and the pitch-black cemetery was suddenly bathed in lamplight. The watchman threw his hands before his eyes, dropping the musket in the process, and we took the opportunity to set off toward the front gate as quickly as our legs would carry us. The sound of footsteps immediately behind us reminded me of the second part of Jean-Claude’s instructions to me, and I quickly closed the shutter on the lamp, plunging the graveyard into darkness once more. Almost immediately I heard the dull thud of flesh and bone meeting solid wood, followed by a series of stinging French epithets, most of which I had never before heard, even from Jean-Claude.
We continued on in the darkness, four sets of footsteps, dodging the large tombstones, barking our shins on the small ones, and generally flailing about in chaotic confusion, until the three of us somehow managed to find our way back to the street, where our pursuer left off his chase and returned to his grim demesne.
Not before we had left several hundred yards of cobbles between the three of us and the graveyard did I finally unshutter the lamp and restore our sense of sight. And a sorry sight it was, too. Jean-Claude sported an angry-looking bump above his right eye and was missing his hat. Thorns and brambles completely covered my own suit, the left coat sleeve of which was but a few threads away from falling off entirely. Even Jimmy, who presented a fairly sad spectacle to begin with, was somewhat the worse for wear. Observing the altogether-disreputable spectacle we presented, and feeling the relief of our narrow escape, I could not help but laugh, and I was soon followed in my mirth by Jimmy, who likewise appreciated the utter ridiculousness of our situation. Jean-Claude, on the other hand, was less amused. “Perhaps you would both like to return to the cemetery for another encounter with the night watchman,” he said, with a disapproving pucker around the corners of his mouth, “so very much did you enjoy that one.”
“No, Jean-Claude,” I replied, stifling my laughter, “my appetite for midnight graveyard chases is quite satisfied for the moment. It’s about time we started back for St. Alban’s, anyway.”
“Yes, it is about the time,” he said curtly. “Let us go.” Then, recovering his composure sufficiently to remember his manners, he addressed Jimmy. “Adieu, my young friend. I am happy that you proved our suspicions to be in error.”
“Likewise,” he replied, and turned to leave us, but paused briefly to express a thought that was troubling him. “I really wish we could have got that box covered up before the watchman found us. The law kind of looks the other way, so long as we fellows go about our work with…what’ya call it?…discretion. But leaving that gentl’man’s grave open like that, for all the world to see…that’s a bad job, and it’s likely going to make things difficult for us…for the people what practice my trade.”
Jimmy’s professional misgivings proved to be disturbingly prophetic, for the headlines of the next evening’s Gazette virtually screamed out the results of our late-night churchyard expedition. BODY SNATCHERS STRIKE ALL SOULS CEMETERY. Jean-Claude and I had spent the entire day carrying out our researches on the cadaver that had already caused us no end of difficulty and would be the source of even greater trouble in the days to come. Having determined not to introduce our unfortunate fellow into the general butchery of the common dissection room—realizing that identification of the corpse would be impossible within a few hours of his arrival there—we embarked instead upon a limited postmortem examination strictly to determine the exact cause of death. It was, as had appeared from the first, a puncture wound to the base of the skull, administered with rather concentrated violence by a sharp object passing unimpeded through the muscle and tendon at the back of the neck, between the atlas and axis vertebrae, and directly into the medulla, producing an undoubtedly instantaneous death. Having satisfied our curiosity on this point, at least, we returned our gentleman to his burlap shroud and hid him underneath a pile of coal until we could deliberate with clearer heads how best to proceed from there.
