The Resurrection Fireplace

by Hiroko Minagawa

As the two spoke, Abbott sidled closer to Nigel. Comparing the drawing Nigel was still working on with its model, he murmured with admiration.

  Sir John heard. “What is it that has met with your approval, Abbott?”

  “If only you could see this picture, Sir John,” he said in a creaky sort of voice. “It looks realer than the thing itself.”

  Barton seized the opportunity to expound on the enormous contribution to the advance of medical science that his pupil’s drawings would make.

  The blind magistrate listened in silence. Then, assisted by Moore and Abbott to the dissecting table, he reached out with both hands and felt the body, using his palms and the tips of his fingers as his eyes.

  Satisfied, he washed his hands in the tub of water Clarence had brought, and dried them thoroughly.

  “Professor Barton,” said Sir John. “As regards Miss Roughhead, we shall wait until this prize pupil of yours finishes his drawing. Thereafter, you are to return the body to its plot at once. I am sure Sir Charles will not object. In any event, he will not wish to bring suit against you at the Old Bailey.”

  “Your generosity is appreciated,” said Barton. He strode towards Sir John and clasped his hands in his own gory paws, shaking them firmly and obliging the magistrate to wash his hands again. “I have one more request, Sir John, knowing you as a friend and advocate of the science of anatomy. Dare I hope that it will be granted?”

  “Perhaps, depending on what it is.”

  “Permit me to make a specimen of the foetus.”

  The magistrate was struck speechless. Barton pressed on.

  “Showing the students real specimens is a vital part of their education,” he said. “Mere textbooks and papers are little use at all. Moreover, the supply of cadavers for dissection is very limited. Foetuses are in particularly short supply since, as you know, women offenders are not hanged if they are expecting. Making this foetus into a specimen would give countless students the rare opportunity to see such a thing with their own eyes.”

  “And what of the feelings of Sir Charles and his wife? Their own grandchild, placed in a bottle and paraded before strangers…”

  “I shall never reveal its provenance.”

  “That is hardly the point.”

  “Edward! Show Sir John one of your preparations.”

  “But Sir John is—”

  “I know he is! Bring one in here!”

  The glass jar Edward brought back immediately attracted Moore’s attention, along with Abbott’s.

  “Anne, what do you see?” asked Sir John.

  “A vivid red… branching, from thicker cords to thread-like tendrils, all tangled into a deformed sphere. The whole is inside a glass container.”

  “It’s a work of art,” said Abbott.

  “Explain to Sir John how it was produced, Edward,” Barton urged.

  “This is the inner structure of a lung. Coloured wax is heated until it liquefies, and then injected into the lung’s air passages. Once the wax cools and hardens, the whole is submerged in acid. The acid eats away the tissue itself, leaving only the wax replica of its structure, as you can see.”

  “Capillary vessels are difficult to see within the organ itself,” Barton told them. “This procedure makes them visible even when they are as fine as down.”

  Edward displayed another jar. “This one is a brain, submerged in a preservative.”

  “Through a long process of trial and error, Edward and I successfully formulated a more effective preserving fluid than any other,” said Barton. “The chief ingredient is alcohol; the other components, and their proportions, are a secret. Glass jars and alcohol are both heavily taxed, and pigments for colouring are also expensive. Without the capital provided by my brother, I should never have been able to assemble my collection.”

  “You refer to Robert Barton, I assume,” said Sir John. “The renowned physician?”

  “Yes. It is he who has made my work as a student of anatomy possible.”

  “Robert was an acquaintance of my own half-brother, the previous magistrate, Henry Fielding. I myself do not often venture into polite society, and so I have not met him personally.”

  “My brother often speaks of you with great affection.”

  The magistrate shrugged. Robert, it seemed, had been embellishing the truth.

  “Have I helped you understand, sir, the importance of these preparations?” asked Barton. When Sir John nodded, he continued: “This foetus is a priceless find. Comparing it with one in normal condition allows direct observation of how arsenic affects a child in its mother’s womb.”

  “What was that?” Moore said. “Arsenic? There must be some mistake. We were told that she died of a sudden illness.”

  “Are you saying that arsenic was the cause of that illness, Professor Barton?”

  “I know only that this woman was exposed to arsenic before her death. Until your inquiries, both her name and background were unknown to me, along with the details of her illness. Accordingly, I cannot state definitely that arsenic was the cause of death as such. There are women who use it to whiten their skin, after all.”

  “You may, perhaps be familiar with the case of the Countess of Coventry, who died some ten years ago at the age of twenty-seven,” Clarence put in. “Her cosmetics killed her. She used a mixture of white lead and arsenic to whiten her face, and both are quite poisonous. Fairness of complexion might be estimable, but that seems a price too high to pay. Better to do as the women of Italy do—remove their paint at night and rub themselves with a mixture of flour and milk. Even Queen Elizabeth daubed her face half an inch deep with some quicksilver cream. It eventually gave her skin a dark and greenish tint and left her wrinkled as a monkey—which, of course, she concealed with more cosmetics, until even her teeth rotted and turned black, I am given to understand. I see that you refrain from using much embellishment, Miss Moore. A wise practice, if I may say so.”

  “How do you know she was exposed to arsenic?” asked Sir John, sounding genuinely and innocently curious.

  Barton casually pulled back the dead woman’s eyelids. “There is haemorrhaging under her conjunctiva. Facial oedema. Then there are her fingernails. They are shrunken, with white spots. The skin on her fingers is peeling also. Such effects are observable on the skin of many victims of arsenic poisoning. I might also mention that she has bruises—lesions on her buttocks which appear to have been caused by some blunt instrument.”

  “Anne?”

  “Everything is as Mr. Barton says,” she confirmed.

  “Could these symptoms have been caused by something other than arsenic?”

  “Possibly. By your leave, I shall perform an experiment to test for arsenic directly.”

  “Yes, by all means. First, however, allow me one question first. My assistant tells me that you said ‘One does not come into possession of a six-months…’”

  Barton’s pupils looked at each other. So she had heard.

  “How, before beginning the dissection, did you know she was six months pregnant? Can external examination alone furnish such detail, even when nothing is known of the time of conception?”

  “We heard it from the grave-robbers who brought her in.”

  “Gobbin and Dick?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did they know, I wonder? The Roughhead family kept it utterly secret.”

  “Perhaps a servant let something slip,” suggested Moore. “Miss Roughhead’s nurse must have noticed her condition.”

  “Question the nurse later.”

  “Her nurse, you say?” Clarence remarked. “Your Runners mentioned her earlier, Sir John. They said that she was so overcome with grief that she took her own life. Isn’t that so, Ben?”

  “It is. As I recall, she was supposed to have poisoned herself at her charge’s grave.”

  “Reports of this hav
e not reached me, Anne.”

  “I did not know myself.”

  “Well, there is no obligation to report every suicide to the magistrate’s office, I suppose. Who were these Runners?”

  “Hales and Bray, it seems. They must have got wind of the grave-robbing and paid a visit here before we did.”

  “Yes, they spoke of it here.”

  “Check with the two of them later, Anne. Now, one more thing before the experiment. How many people are in this room as we speak, apart from the three of us? From the sound of footsteps and the like, I detect six.”

  “Just so, Sir John. Mr. Barton and his five pupils—six in all.”

  “Let us have each of those pupils introduce himself,” said Sir John. “Who is the artist?”

  “That is me,” said Nigel nervously. “Nigel Hart.”

  Edward stood beside him with a hand on his shoulder.

  “And the expert on preparations?”

  “Me. Edward Turner.”

  “I am Clarence Spooner,” said Clarence.

  “Nicknamed ‘the Chatterbox,’” added Anne.

  “Aptly so,” said Sir John. “Who else?”

  “Benjamin Beamis.”

  “A rotund sort of fellow, I deduce.”

  “How did you know?”

  “From your voice. And the last pupil?”

  “Albert Wood,” said Al. “Much skinnier. Could you tell from my voice?”

  “I could not.” The magistrate smiled. “Who else is in the house?”

  “Toby, my doorkeeper, and the maid Nelly. Both Irish. Shall I summon them?”

  “Your doorkeeper we have met. Let us call the maid. Professor Barton, pray begin your experiment.”

  “Ben, fetch Nelly,” the Professor said. “Bring a rat from the kitchen as well. Al and Clarence, prepare a piece of meat dosed with arsenic. Edward, Nigel, ready the test apparatus.”

  When Ben returned from the kitchen, Nelly following close behind, he was carrying an angry, frightened grey rat, gnawing at the bars of the rat-catcher’s cage in which it found itself.

  “Professor,” said Ben. “It seems that Nelly is now keeping urchins as well as rats.”

  “I don’t keep rats,” she replied in an indignant Irish brogue. “They keep themselves. The rat-catcher can’t keep up. As for the boy, well, he came to the door lookin’ fit to drop from hunger, so I gave him some broth and a crust of bread and let him rest a while. Heaven knows you’ve all turned your back on the Good Lord. An act of mercy to atone for your sins can’t do any harm.”

  Nelly was a devout Catholic, and considered it sacrilegious to slice up the dead.

  “Is the boy very weak?” Nigel inquired.

  “Well, he is one of those as eke out a livin’ from beggin’ and mudlarkin’,” she said. “But please don’t confine him, m’lord. He’ll have his strength back after a sit-down and a bite to eat, and then he’ll surely find proper work. Give him a chance.”

  “Rest assured, Nelly, I am not cruel.”

  “Aye, I know it, m’lord. Everyone does. Sir John Fieldin’, friend to the poor, scourge of the wicked. A man who’ll give you a fair trial.”

  The magistrate dismissed her with a wave of his hand.

  Clarence put the cage on a work-bench. Edward and Nigel had also brought in the test apparatus by then. It was a simple U-shaped tube of glass in a wooden frame.

  “One end of the tube has a narrow nozzle attached,” Anne explained for the magistrate’s sake. “They have hung a piece of metal inside the nozzle. Zinc-plated, it would seem.”

  “I smell something acid.”

  “Edward Turner has introduced an acid into the U-shaped pipe through its open end. Now Nigel Hart has brought a candle flame close to the nozzle.”

  Nothing happened.

  Next, the pupils etherized the rat, ignoring its protests. Once it had gone limp, they drew a small quantity of blood from it. This was then mixed with the acid, and the results injected into the tube for testing. Once more, nothing happened. Anne reported the procedure from beginning to end.

  “Sir John,” said Clarence, “as you have seen—I beg your pardon: as you have heard—neither of these two tests revealed the presence of arsenic.”

  They had used only the merest drop of ether, so the rat soon groggily rose to its feet and looked around with what certainly appeared to those watching to be a look of suspicion.

  “Forgive me, little fellow,” said Ben, feeding it the piece of meat.

  Moore informed the magistrate of the rat’s death.

  Once it had stopped moving, Edward drew blood from its corpse, mixed it with acid, and introduced the mixture into the tube.

  Nigel brought the candle close.

  “Flames have emerged from the nozzle,” cried Anne.

  Barton held a piece of porcelain close to the flames. The white porcelain was quickly covered in a glossy black film.

  “The porcelain has become a mirror,” Anne said, astonished again.

  “When arsenic and zinc come into contact, they emit a flammable gas,” Clarence said, a conjurer explaining his trick. “The flames, in turn, create a mirror film on porcelain. Like the alchemists of centuries past, we pursue the truth through repeated experiment. This marvellous apparatus was invented by Edward.”

  “There happened to be some porcelain nearby during an earlier experiment,” the latter said modestly. “I was astonished myself to see it change colour and become mirror-like.”

  After washing the pipe, they drew some blood from the dead woman’s body and repeated the procedure. Once more, flames spouted from the nozzle; once again, a piece of white porcelain was seared to a dark mirror.

  “We have established that Miss Roughhead did absorb some arsenic,” Sir John said. “But whether this was through malicious design or in cosmetics and the like, we cannot say. Is that correct, Professor Barton?”

  “Indeed it is,” he confirmed. “If we could continue our dissection, opening the stomach and intestines would permit us to determine whether the arsenic was consumed orally or not.”

  “By all means, do so. Now, I understand that Miss Roughhead’s cadaver was not alone.”

  “There were two other bodies,” admitted Barton reluctantly.

  “Two bodies in all, you mean—Miss Roughhead and the amputated boy.”

  “Another has come to light,” said Barton.

  “It was in the students’ dissection room,” said Edward, not mentioning that shortly before it was at the bottom of the chimney flue.

  “When did you discover it?” asked Moore sternly. “Before my visit, or after?”

  “After.”

  “Do you know when it was put there?”

  “We do not. The place was not in use due to the summer holiday.”

  The group moved to the other room, all except Nigel, who stayed behind to keep drawing.

  The dead youth’s chest and abdomen were still open.

  As Moore described the state of the cadaver, the magistrate used both hands to feel and confirm it, brow furrowing slightly when he felt the stump above the boy’s right elbow.

  “We found no signs of poisoning,” Al said. “Neither the stomach nor intestinal wall showed damage due to any poisonous substance. His stomach was almost empty. It was already impossible to determine from the content of his intestines what he had been eating.”

  “He died some time after his final meal, then,” said Sir John. “Was it from loss of blood during the amputations? Or were they performed after his death? What say you, Professor?”

  “Today’s medical science, I regret to report, cannot answer that question,” said Barton. “A means for determining such things has not yet been discovered. If microscopes could show finer detail, much that is now obscure would surely be disclosed, but at present using these instrum
ents is like wearing spectacles with poorly ground lenses. They magnify twenty times, but the image is so blurred and distorted that the naked eye is a better tool. A most frustrating situation. Cadavers have much more to report to us, if we can only learn to decode it… . And for this reason, too, the development of the science of anatomy is vital. Sir John, I beg of you, have the laws improved. Grant us lawful access to cadavers.”

  “Unfortunately, my powers do not extend that far.”

  “But you have revolutionized policing,” the Professor said. “Your record is outstanding.”

  “Nevertheless, the government’s unwillingness to cooperate leaves us severely underfunded.”

  “People are understandably wary of granting a law force too much power. But the peace cannot be kept by unofficial means.”

  “You understand the matter well.”

  “The public must be enlightened,” Barton said. “Just as they must in combating the prejudice against dissection.”

  “We are in agreement, then. Now, where is the third body?”

  They led Sir John to an adjacent table and removed the cloth covering the remains.

  Moore gasped. Abbott gritted his teeth.

  “I shall explain, Sir John,” she said. “This body has no face. Furthermore, the abdomen and chest are split open—”

  “They were opened for dissection,” said Clarence.

  “No face? Has it been decapitated?” asked Sir John.

  “No. The head is attached, but the face has been obliterated,” she told him. “I would rather not describe the details.”

  “But you must. You are my eyes.”

  “Very well.

  The magistrate reached out to touch the shattered face as his assistant described what his fingers probed. When he was finished there, he examined the rest of the body. “This man does not seem to have been of the labouring class.”

  “His fingernails are clean,” Moore observed.

  “A writer by trade, perhaps. There is a callus on the first joint of his right middle finger. Are the tips of his fingers stained with ink?”

  “Not noticeably, but ink is visible in the creases of his knuckles.”

  “Can you tell how old he was, Professor Barton?”