Corpse Thief

by Michael Arnold

“Why’s he call you that?” Big Bill murmured as he shored up the hole with deft pats of the trowel, like a builder laying mortar.

  “Sólyom?” Hawke panted. The shallow excavation was clear enough now, and he held up the shovel like a poised guillotine blade, pausing for the others to get out of the way. “It means hawk.”

  “Latin or summink,” Goaty said. His mutilated face, lit on one side by the wan glow of the lantern, looked like something conjured from hellish nightmare.

  Blackbird cuffed their dog-chewed confederate. “Hungario, you doltish bastard.”

  Goaty rubbed his boxed ear, then glanced sideways at Hawke. “Corissa likes you, Sólyom, did you know?”

  Now Hawke paused. He straightened. Heat came to his neck and cheeks in waves, though he was not certain whether it was borne of excitement or terror. “Oh?”

  Goaty grinned salaciously. “Says you ain’t normal.”

  “I’d stay clear of that slattern if you value your stones,” Blackbird warned, the low volume emphasising his already languorous accent. He nodded at the hole, indicating for Hawke to get back to work, and swung another backhand at Goaty.

  Goaty ducked this time, still grinning. “Says you ain’t who you say you are.”

  Curses filled Hawke’s mind now, a chorus of taunting alarms. The heat in his face turned ice cool. “I was not always a resurrectionist, that’s true,” he managed to say, despite a rapidly parching tongue. Christ, he thought, but she had given him away. What a fool he had been. He had opened his heart to her, betrayed himself, and all for what? Begrudging and ultimately worthless assistance in a case with which he had never sought to be involved. He would be strung up, or worse, for his stupidity. And for unrequited lust.

  “Before this?” Goaty persisted. “What you do oop north?”

  Hawke wondered if he should attack now. Swing the spade for all he was worth. But what could he hope to achieve? He might take Goaty, the nearest man, out of the fight, but the rest would tear him limb from limb. It was all futile. He gripped the wooden handle till his nails dug into the flesh of his fingers, bracing himself for a blow from cudgel or knife, and jammed the tool downward, splintering the coffin’s pine lid with the first thrust. No strike came from behind, no one moved at all, so he repeated the action thrice more, even as he expected death, until the lamplight flooded the upper section of the corpse.

  Hawke breathed hard, peering down at the pale shroud that concealed the woman’s face, hoping no one could tell that it was fear rather than exertion that had overwhelmed him. Still none of the gang produced a weapon or spoke a challenge. He looked at Goaty. “What I did up north,” he said, stressing his accent, “is none of your fucking business.” He moved out of the way, arching his agonised back until it gave a dull clunk, then dropped the spade. He glanced at Blackbird. “She’s all yours.”

  The West Indian produced a long coil of rope from the sack and rounded on the others. “Pull her up, you lazy bastards.”

  It took only moments for men expert in their trade to loop the rope about the cadaver. Goaty, Gilroy and Big Bill took up position along the length of the thick braid, with Blackbird at the back, the tail looped about his waist. They dug heels into the short grass and hauled, each man doing his best to stifle a grunt.

  Hawke was excused the task because he had dug. By rights he should have slunk into the darkness to play lookout, but all he could do was stand and stare, because he was numb. Had Corissa betrayed him? It still seemed likely. And Szekely was not the kind of man who would delegate so personal a revenge to his lackeys. A swift dagger between the shoulder-blades would be a fate too clean for a traitor. Yet still Hawke lived when he had expected to take the place of the farrier’s wife, and he could not help but tremble with relief.

  The operation was executed swiftly, for the prize was skinny as a rake and light as a sack of feathers. She was already quite stiff, but she slid up and out of the shattered coffin with minimal resistance, hissing over the frosty earth. The men shifted four or five steps backwards as though victorious in a tug of war, then, upon Blackbird’s grunted command, halted and dropped the line.

  Gilroy Penley took up the small lamp and moved one of its shutters to direct a soft light by which they might work, while Goaty and Big Bill set to unwinding the shroud that had already begun to work loose, threatening to entangle them and waylay their task. They tossed it back into the grave. In the dim illumination, the farrier’s wife glowed like an alabaster statue. The right side of her skull had collapsed completely, cracked like an egg shell by the horse’s hoof.

  Big Bill swore softly, screwing up his face in disgust. “Made a mess of her, right enough.”

  Goaty sniffed. “Vine’ll do worse.” He knelt beside the corpse, sliding gloved hands up and down her naked torso to ensure she had not been laid to rest with any item of value. His fingers lingered on her small breasts, kneading the pale flesh for a few seconds, and then he stood. “Clean.”

  “Sack her up,” Blackbird said, before shooting Hawke a quick glance.

  The rest of the gang unfurled the large bag that was to be the woman’s temporary tomb. Hawke fetched up his shovel and went to fill the grave.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  TUESDAY

  It was during the night’s smallest hours, pitch dark and oppressively cold, that they reached the anatomy school on Stanhope Street, stealing in through the side entrance like thieves. Except that they were not thieves, not by the letter of the law, which was what made the business of the sack-’em-up men so attractive. The building was as quiet as the graveyard had been, positively sepulchral once they were out of the watery moonlight, but Blackbird led the way with the lamp while the others hefted the bulging sack between them, grunting and scraping through corridors and doorways, their shadows climbing and morphing on the whitewashed walls like dancing ghouls until eventually they came to the school’s inner sanctum. The Anatomy Theatre had presumably been the main reception room in what had once been a spacious townhouse, but now the benches around the outside gave it the feel of an auditorium, the focus placed upon the trio of empty tables at the room’s centre.

  It was to the middle table that Blackbird directed them. With a collective groan, they unceremoniously placed the sack upon it, shaking one end so that the corpse gradually emerged, a waxy moth from a grotesque chrysalis.

  “As agreed,” Blackbird intoned, seemingly addressing himself.

  “She is in poor health,” came a reply from the murky abyss of a far corner.

  Hawke and the others turned to see a small figure emerge. Doctor Theophilus Vine lifted the candle to illuminate his face, the light making his sharp nose look incongruous in his little round face, reflecting bright from the thick lenses he wore, and from the polished surgical instruments that were arrayed all around.

  Blackbird shot Vine a sour look. “Horse did that,” he waved a big hand at the crumpled skull, “not us. You were forewarned of the condition.”

  “Even so,” Doctor Vine said, his nasal tone more grating than usual in the silence of the hour, “I had intended to unlock the secrets of the brain.”

  “Then you’re a fool,” Blackbird replied.

  Vine looked upon each of the resurrection men, the disgust clear in his face. After an extended breath, he said, “Still, she’s an acceptable specimen from the neck down, wouldn’t you say, Clementine?”

  A woman in long cloak and nightcap stepped into the combined glow of candle and lamp. Clementine, Vine’s assistant, moved almost silently across the room to peruse the corpse. She was as intimidating as Hawke remembered, stockily built for a woman, her face flat, nose squashed by some half-forgotten violence, beady eyes black and shining like those of a crow. She pursed her lips, assessing the condition. “She’ll do.”

  Vine nodded curtly, pulling a leather pouch from the pocket of the apron he perpetually seemed to wear. “You’ll take five for her.”

  It was not a question, but Blackbird shook his head all the same. He rounded his
big shoulders, gathering himself to his full height. “We’ll take eight.”

  “The product is damaged,” Vine protested, pushing his spectacles further up the bridge of his nose.

  “It is eight guineas for a large and five for a small.” Blackbird nodded at the pale body. “This is a large.”

  “Six, then,” Vine countered, “as a favour to Mister Szekely.”

  “Make it seven,” said Blackbird, “and I won’t tell Mister Szekely you tried to swindle him.” He winked, the scar at the corner of his eye pulling taut so that his cheek puckered as though tugged on the end of a string. “As a favour to you.”

  Vine’s expression tightened, but he said, “Two more guineas, Clementine, if you please.”

  Clementine left the table and swept from the room. She returned in a matter of seconds, bearing two more coins that she handed to her master. Vine dropped them into the purse with a grudging sigh, and tossed the full pouch to Blackbird.

  “Now, gentlemen,” Vine said, the noun uttered with an unconcealed sneer, “I bid you a good night, what’s left of it.” He looked at Blackbird. “Tell Mister Szekely that I shall see him this evening for King Lear at the Theatre Royal. The entr’acte to the fifth act will be performed by Monsieur Blanc’s ensemble. A rare treat indeed.”

  Blackbird’s expression signified that he gave not a fig for their high-minded entertainments, but nodded all the same, indicating with a perfunctory wave that the gang should take their leave.

  A self-satisfied smile emerged upon Vine’s face. “Not that you would appreciate such a thing.”

  Blackbird coughed up a lump of phlegm, spitting it onto the tiled floor before the anatomist. “Fuck off, Doctor,” he said simply. “Think I’d want to watch a clown prance about to music? Tis the dogs for us.”

  Goaty’s mangled mouth drew back in what might have been a grin. “And an ape.”

  “An ape?” Vine said, nonplussed.

  “They’re to bait an ape,” Gilroy elaborated, Goaty’s excitement reflected in his own voice. “A big thing. Mean as hell. Bright red arse and huge fangs, so the rumour goes. Fights like the devil.”

  Theophilus Vine wrinkled his pointed nose in revulsion. “How far mankind has fallen, eh?” Behind the doctor, Clementine muttered an amen.

  Blackbird laughed grimly. “So say those who will shortly pull out the guts of a recently deceased young woman.” He looked to Hawke, who was perusing a row of hooks, from which various grim-looking implements dangled. “You coming to the pit?”

  “Home for me, I think,” Hawke said, and he meant it. Black Horse Yard had served its purpose. It was time to return to Buckbridge Street.

  Blackbird twisted his mouth perfunctorily. “Suit yourself.”

  Θ

  But before he could return to St Giles, and before the ape would be terrorised to death to slake the blood-lust of a baying mob, Hawke had business south of the river. To that end, a little prior to midday, he took a drop of laudanum, then a boat from Coleharbour Stairs.

  The day was cold and crisp, the light feeble, the sky grey as a wolf pelt, but the brown waters of the Thames, though they roared and swirled, were no match for the gruff boatman’s expertise during a crossing that was as swift and uneventful as he could have hoped. He alighted at Horseshoe Alley, tossing the boatman a coin as he made his way up steps eroded by the feet of centuries. As he climbed, he checked the long blade, concealed beneath his greatcoat, gleaning confidence from the hard handle pressed at his waist. Bankside was no Seven Dials, especially during daylight, but that did not mean it was devoid of danger. The Surrey side of the great river often struck Hawke as something of a melting pot. A place to which communities from all parts of an ever-shrinking globe tended to gravitate, for work or trade, refuge or plain criminality. Folk came to London for the north bank, of course. For those streets that promised cobbles of gold. But Southwark was where so often they ended up, that part of the city that was both within and without the metropolis, extending its tentacles ever southward, new homes and new industry filling the open spaces where once open fields had stretched. Hawke found Southwark exciting. A forward-looking community, seeing hope in the opening of each new brewhouse or factory, yet never managing to still the beat of its dark heart. It was not the lawless place of old, for the days of liberties that were outside the city’s boundaries and beyond the reach of its elders were long gone, but the dubious entertainments on offer, the rows of gin palaces, the taverns, gaming dens and the countless brothels, each bearing testament to the south bank’s earliest incarnation, continued to thrive unabated.

  Hawke walked along Bankside, keeping the pungent river on his right, the square tower of St Saviour’s piercing the hoary sky at his back. Down on the thin strip of cloying shoreline, a tribe of mudlarks waded through the filth, skinny legs black to the groin as they sought treasures in defiance of the cold. On his left loomed rows of buildings of various ages and styles, of homes, shops, mansions, churches and taverns, high and low, straight and leaning, fresh and decayed. The area had the feel of an architectural patchwork, straddling the ages, something that its counterpart to the north lacked after the scourge of the Great Fire. Already Hawke could see movement in the windows of the three and four storey tenements, shutters being thrust back to reveal the painted faces of prostitutes who duly began to call and whistle. Despite himself, he glanced up, catching the eye of one woman in particular, who beckoned him with a blown kiss and coquettish wink. He might have taken up the invitation, but time was of the essence, and he pressed on, her shrieked abuse ringing in his ears.

  The roads hereabouts were busy with traffic. Sturdy dray carts in the main, transporting barrels of goods between Southwark and the moored barges that would take them eastwards, through the treacherous water that creamed at London Bridge’s arches, and out to the docks. Many vehicles were branded with the same emblem, and, when one came close enough to make out, Hawke saw that it was a picture of an anchor. Corissa had told him to pass the Anchor Brewery, the largest in the world, on his way to the Red Petal, so he watched one such cart thunder by, sweeping left and down a road barely wide enough to accommodate it. At the end of that thoroughfare, the cart drew to a halt before the ornate ironwork of a pair of huge gates, incongruous in the otherwise drab surroundings. The gates were marked with the same anchor symbol, and Hawke knew that he was heading in the right direction.

  All the same, he resolved to stay close to the river to keep his bearings. After thirty more yards he encountered a blind woman, wrapped tight in a threadbare cloak, perched on a stool before an iron-bound rundlet from which she was selling curds and whey. A gaggle of black-faced chimney sweeps surrounded her, slurping the stuff from shallow wooden bowls, putting Hawke in mind of ravens at a discarded hunk of bread. The scene piqued his own sense of hunger, and he stopped, purchased a bowl-full for fortitude, and asked the boys the way to the bawdy house. Sure enough, the lads pointed the way, and he thanked them with a few pennies. Invigorated by the curds and whey, he quickened his step, striding into the busy jets of vapour that poured from his nostrils. He passed three drinking dens in succession, a net-maker’s workshop and a sailcloth merchant, before crossing the yawning frontage of a vast warehouse, where a team of burly men with sleeves rolled to elbows lugged heavy-looking sacks from the back of a wagon. As Hawke drew nearer, the rich aroma of tea, coffee and cocoa supplanted the stink of the river, and he breathed deep, imagining the exotic climes of China, India, Ceylon and South America from whence this precious cargo had come. The leaves and beans would be graded in the warehouse, he supposed. Weighed and blended, roasted or ground, and then distributed to the corners of the Empire, returning as gold coins to fill a fat merchant’s coffers. The distaste at the thought must have registered on Hawke’s face, for he realised the warehousemen were sharing some jest as they watched him walk by, and he cast his eyes downward, eager to avoid confrontation.

  He reached the Red Petal a few minutes later, which, like so many similar establish
ments, was a tall, jettied affair overlooking the Thames, with pale faces at windows open to the elements. A relief in the shape of a rose, its peeling paint faded to light pink, had been carved onto the lintel above a gloomy porch. Hawke approached, to be met by two thick-set fellows carrying cudgels, who emerged from the shadows above the single step.

  “I would speak with the procurer, Mistress Yvette,” Hawke said, taking a rearward pace to put daylight between himself and the weaponry. From further off came the clanging din of the foundry Corissa had mentioned, its metallic song underlying all else.

  The heavies were tall and short, respectively, though both seemed like giants to Hawke with the extra foot of height afforded by the step. The bigger one, muscular arms rippling beneath a close-fitting white shirt, had a dark beard, severely canted nose and long, black hair that cascaded from beneath a battered tricorne hat. His bareheaded compatriot was as bald as an egg, almost as wide as the doorway, and wore a permanently sardonic grin, given by thick scarring at the corners of his mouth. It was he who spoke. “Would you, now?” His rasping voice, low and menacing, carried the hint of a Cumbrian upbringing. He scratched a bestubbled cheek. “And who might you be, cully?”

  Hawke said, still thinking of the foundry, “Smith.”

  The bald man chuckled. “’Course it is.” His pebble eyes roved over Hawke. “Money first. To come up, you must cough up.”

  “I am not looking for girls,” Hawke said.

  “Boys, then?” the bald fellow replied, the scars upturning as he smirked. “We’ve plenty o’ those too, if you can afford them. And we’ve a dwarf wench, if that pleases.” His tongue protruded through chapped lips like a fat slug. “Great dexterity, I promise you.”

  Hawke shook his head. “The procurer. The bawd, gentlemen, if you please. I would speak with...” A malodorous wave washed over him before he could complete the sentence, and he covered his face with the crook of an arm. It was acidic in nature, eye-watering, and he gagged involuntarily as the men guarding the door broke into mocking laughter.