The Resurrection Fireplace

by Hiroko Minagawa

  Chapter 9

  The Professor returned home to find three of his pupils waiting for him. Charlie wagged his tail without getting up.

  “I am extremely and unusually weary,” said Barton, flopping into a chair. “Let us talk another day.”

  He felt as though he sat with his back to the edge of a cliff.

  His brother was ensnared in debts he had no way of repaying, which put the collection that Barton had spent his life assembling in danger of being carted away. As long as it remained on display in Robert’s home, there was no risk of its being lost, whether his brother claimed ownership or not, but if it fell into other hands, it might be sold to anyone, anywhere. There was certainly a demand for such items.

  “Professor,” said Al. “As I believe Edward told you, we are not the only ones who know of the fireplace’s structure.”

  “So I gather.”

  “I have revealed the name of the other person to Clarence and Ben.”

  “My brother?”

  “Yes.”

  “We agree with Al’s theory too,” said Clarence. “It must be him. He would have assumed that we were not aware of how the fireplace worked, making it the perfect hiding place.”

  Ben nodded.

  “The smell of decay would be disguised by the school’s other cadavers,” Al said. “Once we began laying fires in the hearth again, the naked body would be smoked like a side of bacon. It was disfigured just in case, but thought to be safe from discovery. Indeed, we ourselves might not have noticed how the fireplace was built were it not for our work installing the winch. I am not fond of Dr. Barton, but it is hard to think of him as the author of such a brutal act. And yet…”

  “Whose body was it, I wonder?”

  “Are Edward and Nigel upstairs?” asked Barton.

  “They have not come back yet. But Nigel was with you, surely, sir. Did you not see Edward at the bank?”

  “There were complications.”

  “After you left, the magistrate’s assistant and the Trapper called,” said Clarence.

  “‘The Trapper’…? Ah, you mean—?” He bared his teeth, and ground them for good measure.

  “Exactly. They said that Sir John wished to see you.”

  “That wish has been fulfilled.”

  “You went to the magistrate’s office?”

  “I did.”

  “Professor, can we not share what we know?” said Al. Although the oldest, he did not assert himself often, partly because the Chatterbox was so indefatigable. Still, there was urgency in his words now. “What troubles you troubles us as well—all of us. We all understand that the school could not go on without your brother’s financial support. Losing him would bring all dissection, experimentation, and research to an end. If you tell us to seal our lips regarding Dr. Barton, we shall do so. We can be trusted to act in your interests, come what may. And so we beg you—allow us to co-operate in giving you assistance. That is all we want.”

  “Hear, hear,” said the other two loyally.

  “I am grateful that you feel that way, truly,” said Barton. “However, I do not have my own thoughts in order yet.” He paused for a moment. “The faceless man is all but identified. A man named Paddington—no, Harrington. He publishes a newspaper called the Public Journal.”

  “That tattle sheet?” said Ben.

  “Sir John called it a vile publication. Do you make a habit of reading that sort of thing?”

  “The tattle is diverting.”

  “The publisher was sentenced to the stocks,” said Clarence. “I went to look.”

  “So did I,” admitted Ben.

  “When was that—a few months ago? Do you remember the public protest demanding that Wilkes be returned to Parliament?”

  “Only indirectly.”

  “A gin factory was burnt down, too.”

  “And the Public Journal’s publisher was gaoled for his inflammatory articles.”

  “He deserved far worse,” frowned Al. “The man was a market manipulator. Helped drive up stock prices and then cause a collapse.”

  “You mean the Pacific Company?” said Barton. “Sir John mentioned it, and the bank manager explained it all to me. You are well informed, Al.”

  “My father is a trader, so he is quite alert to matters of this sort. He has some money in the market himself. Fortunately, he is as strict as a bank, and only invests in reliable companies. The Pacific affair, however, remains notorious. No small number of people have been bankrupted by it. —Oh! Was Dr. Barton an investor, too?”

  “How did you know?”

  “Anyone might guess as much from this conversation. If Dr. Barton was ruined by the Pacific business, he would certainly have wanted to dispatch that journalist.”

  Barton groaned. “He was trapped by a broker,” he said, although he had not intended to bother his pupils with it at first.

  “A broker? Which one?” pressed Al. “Surely not Evans?”

  “You know him?”

  “My father told me about him. He said that Evans was behind the entire ‘bubble’—in league with Harrington. Dissembling is a useful skill for any broker, but it seems that Evans is a master of the art. He also ensures that the powerful see a profit, which means that he enjoys protection even from government officials.”

  “Hume said that, too,” nodded Barton. “I shall retire upstairs to rest. If Edward and Nigel return, send them to my quarters.” And with that, he trudged upstairs.

  The others watched from the foot of the staircase. Charlie looked up and wagged his tail, still without getting up.

  “It occurred to us soon enough, so Sir John is bound to be watching Dr. Barton closely too.”

  “Which means the school might have to close.”

  “As if we would allow that!”

  “Why kill Harrington, I wonder?”

  “If it was murder, there’s no hope.”

  “And what about the other one?”

  “The boy?”

  “Yes.”

  “When Edward and Nigel come back, shall we hound them until they talk?” asked Clarence.

  “No,” Al said firmly. “There is surely more to their situation than we know, but if we press them too insistently Nigel might break down.” He paused. “Let our friend and colleague Edward confide in us.”

  Chapter 10

  From Matthew’s coffee-house, Nathan made his way to Barton’s school of anatomy.

  The dog followed the same route.

  They arrived at a building with a stone staircase, which the dog bounded up at once. This was Nathan’s destination. At the head of the stairs was a set of imposing double doors. Viewed from the street, the whole appeared to be a single building, but Edward had explained that the doors actually opened onto a courtyard, with the anatomy school and Barton’s residence on the right, and his brother Robert’s house on the left.

  Part of one door had been converted into a small wicket-gate, which opened inwards when the dog nudged it with its head. Nathan followed the dog’s lead and crawled inside.

  The windows of the inner buildings were all dark, leaving him only starlight to see by. He could not make out much of the courtyard, but he saw a gravel path leading past some ornamental pots to the building on the right.

  Nathan was less concerned about someone hearing his footsteps than he had been at the start of his escape. Still, he held his breath as he followed the path. He had slipped through the double doors without permission. If he were seen and questioned, would they believe that he had come to see Edward and Nigel? It was the middle of the night. What if they refused to let him meet his friends and simply handed him over to the Bow Street Runners? If he told them about Evans, would they understand? If they were to contact Evans… Assuming that Evans could have men released from prison, he could also put them behind
bars again. Nathan could never return to Newgate. If Evans sent him back there, no one would get him out this time.

  The building where Edward and Nigel slept loomed black. Nathan grasped the handle of what he took to be the students’ entrance. He expected it to be locked, but the door swung inwards with a quiet creak.

  It was even darker inside the building, where not even starlight reached. Nathan advanced nervously, keeping one hand on the wall.

  Chapter 11

  Let our friend and colleague Edward confide in us.

  Ben and Clarence had agreed to this, but when their friend and colleague was half-carried back into the house by Abbott, inevitably they had some questions. Edward kept one hand pressed to his side, blood oozing between his fingers. Nigel, accompanying him, had lost all colour from his lips.

  After lowering himself into a chair with Abbott’s help, the first thing Edward said was, “Where is the Professor?”

  Clarence pointed upstairs. “Exhausted,” he said.

  “Please speak quietly. I do not want him to know that I am back, lest my condition add to his concerns.”

  “And what of our concerns?” Clarence said. “We are suffocating under their weight. Nor does your refusal to talk help matters. What on earth happened to you?”

  They helped Edward remove his shirt. Blood dripped from the laceration in his side. “Nothing serious,” he said, before giving a strangled cry: Al had poked a finger doused with alcohol into the wound.

  “Not too worrying,” Al agreed, removing his finger and checking how far up it had been bloodied. “About half an inch at its deepest point. No organs were reached. Not near any arteries. We simply need to staunch the bleeding, disinfect the wound, and sew it up.”

  Ben brought Edward a glass of wine with laudanum from the kitchen. Peering over his shoulder into the room, Nelly stiffened at the sight confronting her. As her mouth began to open, Al and Clarence quickly clamped their hands over it before she could wail.

  “Quiet, please, Nelly,” said Edward. “Professor Barton will hear.”

  Nelly nodded vigorously. When the other two removed their hands, she covered her mouth again with her own. Edward waved her back into the kitchen.

  “Mr. Turner, Mr. Hart,” said Abbott. “I shall ask you once more. Do you honestly have no idea who might have attacked you?”

  “None, sir.”

  “None.”

  “Were I Sir John, I could judge the truth of that,” he muttered.

  Edward groaned again as Ben pierced his skin with a needle. Ben was the son of a tailor; Clarence’s father, incidentally, was a barber.

  “Your assailant was a young man,” said Abbott. “To judge from his dress, a low-bred person.”

  “He must have been after our purses,” said Nigel. “Even in the middle of the day it can happen, as long as no one is around to see.”

  “Yes, but if I had not come running, he might have finished you off, you know.”

  “Does Sir John suspect us of something?” Nigel asked.

  Abbott seemed startled. “Not in the slightest.”

  “Was that not why you were able to come to our assistance when we were attacked just now—because you had been following us?”

  “I had orders from Sir John to ask at an establishment called Matthew’s about the boy Nathan Cullen. I went alone, as Miss Moore was accompanying the magistrate in court, and happened to see you emerging from the coffee-house. I, er…” He faltered for a moment. “I had also been told to keep an eye out for you.”

  “So you were watching them,” said Clarence. “But why them?”

  Abbott ignored the question. “From where I was standing, a passer-by appeared to stumble into Mr. Turner,” he said. “When Mr. Turner collapsed, I realized the matter was more serious and ran to him. His assailant, to my regret, made good his escape.”

  “You have our thanks for seeing us home,” said Nigel. “We shall treat Edward’s wound and put him to bed, so there is no reason to stay longer.”

  “My report to Sir John will reach him after the afternoon session in court. I can assure you that the man who did this shall be found and arrested.”

  So saying, Abbott turned and left.

  “Does this hurt?” Ben ran the needle through once more.

  “Of course it does. Be gentle, will you.”

  “I cannot do it any more gently than this. The thread must be drawn tight or the wound will not close… . Charlie, there is no point in hoping. This is not a dissection.”

  “The laudanum was perhaps too weak. Do you want more wine?”

  “No, I might become addicted.”

  Al leaned in and examined the wound with a magnifying glass.

  “Nigel, record that… no, you must be too upset—Clarence, keep a record, if you please. The skin has opened outwards. The depth of the wound we ascertained to be half an inch. As for length…”

  “This might be an autopsy.”

  “‘Leave the autopsies to us.’ Was it not you who told the magistrate that, Clarence? This will be good practice.”

  “Am I a practice cadaver, then?” asked Edward, getting almost to the end of the sentence before groaning again.

  “Seven stitches to go,” said Ben, his fingers bloody.

  Obeying an unspoken request in a look from Edward, Nigel pushed a small cloth-wrapped rod into his mouth to bite on. He then knelt down beside him.

  “Whoever did this was no professional,” said Ben as he worked the needle. “If it was money he wanted, he would have used the blade to threaten. If murder was his intent, he would have stumbled into Edward’s chest and struck there. But the wound is shallow—although I will allow that half an inch is no mere scratch. A very curious injury.”

  “It would scarcely have breached the fat on you, Ben.”

  “Be quiet and focus on the task at hand, please,” said Nigel. “We do not need another Clarence.”

  “So, let me speak,” demanded Clarence.

  “What would you say?” Ben asked.

  He thought for a moment. “Nothing in particular,” he admitted.

  Once the stitches were complete, Ben cut the thread. Now well gnawed, the stick was removed from Edward’s mouth, and a bandage was wound about him from side to shoulder. All five of them, both Edward and those attending to him, were perspiring.

  “Will you rest upstairs?” asked Al.

  “The stairs would be too painful. Here will do.”

  “Edward,” Al said, his voice growing serious. “Talk to us.”

  “It hurts to speak.”

  “I will talk,” said Nigel uncharacteristically. “Edward, let me tell them. You cannot take all this on yourself.”

  “It is not their problem.”

  “That applies to Nathan. But the matter regarding Dr. Barton affects us all.”

  The other three were in vigorous agreement.

  “Tell us, by God! There should be no secrets between us,” said Clarence. “A new rule, but one that will be adopted unanimously, I think.”

  “No objection here,” said Ben, raising his hand.

  “Peremptory, perhaps, but it gets my vote,” said Al.

  Edward nodded weakly. They looked at Nigel.

  “We know our adversary,” he told them. “Edward and I were attacked by some ne’er-do-well unknown to us, but we are certain as to who engaged his services.”

  “Who was it?”

  “A man called Guy Evans.”

  The name was clearly familiar to them.

  “You know him?”

  “We know that he worked with Harrington, the publisher of the Public Journal, to play the market,” said Al. “The Professor’s brother fell prey to their scheme and is now heavily in debt.”

  “Yes. Edward heard this from Mr. Hume at the Temple Bank. It was Edw
ard who told Professor Barton.”

  “And it seems that the faceless fellow from the fireplace was Harrington… . Why does that not surprise you?”

  “It was always a possibility,” said Nigel. “It was Harrington’s lies that ruined Robert Barton, and forced him to put the Professor’s preparations up as security.”

  The comment caused consternation.

  “What did you say!? The preparations?”

  “When the time came for Dr. Barton to settle his account, he borrowed the money from Evans, offering the specimens as warranty.”

  “That would explain the Professor’s mood.”

  “But surely if his brother were to resort to murder, his first target would be Evans,” objected Al. “He could simply kill him and burn the IOU. Why Harrington?”

  “At Evans’s insistence, we believe. Evans had reason to want him out of the way.”

  “What reason?”

  “It is a long story.”

  “Take all day and the next if you must, man, but tell it,” Clarence said.

  “You seem to know all about this, Nigel, so let me ask one question first,” said Al. “Even if Evans wanted to make a murderer of Robert, why should Robert agree to it? If he were caught, it would end his life.” They were not bothered calling the elder Barton brother by his given name now.

  “Blackmail, and bait.”

  “The bait I understand—exemption from debt. But blackmail? Was Evans privy to some other dark secret of Robert’s, apart from his debts?”

  “The pregnant woman.”

  “Miss Roughhead?”

  Nigel explained their theory that Robert had violated and eventually murdered Elaine. “And if Evans knew of this… ,” he added.

  “… He would have Robert caught firmly by the tail,” Al acknowledged.

  There was a long silence before Clarence said what they were all thinking: “A death sentence for Robert would mean the death of this school as well.”

  “Evans and Harrington were working together, weren’t they?” said Al. “Why should Evans…?”

  “For the same reason Edward and I were attacked. It has to do with the dead boy.”