by A. Wendeberg
‘At least you haven’t lost your humour. Nurse!’ Johnston waved at a woman clad in crisply-starched linen. They moved Sévère into the ward, and pulled off his trousers.
‘Hum. Bruising and swelling of the knee joint. Did you hear a pop or a crunch?’
Sévère shuddered at the memory. ‘There was a popping noise.’
‘Hum. I’ll examine your leg now to see if and where it is fractured. It might hurt a little. Let me know if you require morphia.’
Sévère nodded once and watched Johnston’s hands probe and squeeze. He grew more tense the closer Johnston got to the injury.
‘Does this hurt? Tell me where and when precisely it hurts.’
Sévère could only grunt.
‘I doubt it’s broken. It would hurt significantly more.’ Seeing Sévère’s raised eyebrows, Johnston added, ‘You would have climbed up that wall had I shifted fractured bones, lad.’
‘What’s wrong with the knee, then?’
‘Well, I believe you have an injury to the knee due to a hyperextension of the joint. We can only hope that ligaments and cartilage weren’t torn. I’m not sure how this could have happened from a fall as you’ve described it. But you were limping before, and I can feel that your left leg is very slightly atrophied. Why is that?’
‘I don’t know. You’re the surgeon.’
‘You never took that to a physician?’ Johnston pointed at Sévère’s leg.
‘No.’
Johnston frowned and pushed his spectacles higher up his nose. ‘Might it be that you have a good idea what’s causing the weakness of your leg?’
‘A suspicion, but not a very good one.’
‘Tell me, then.’
Sévère let out a sigh, and looked up at the ceiling. ‘When I was ten I fell ill. My left leg was paralysed completely, the right leg from the knee downwards. Sometimes, for perhaps a year and a half now, there’s a prickling beneath my skin, running up and down the left side. It reminds me of the pain I felt when I was paralysed. But it can’t be coming back. I’ve never heard of such a thing.’
‘Ah.’ Johnston took off his spectacles, and methodically polished them on his lapel. ‘I’ve heard it from several colleagues and seen it twice now. A surgeon up in Edinburgh is conducting a study on it. He’s asked all major hospitals in Britain to send him data on infant paralysis: number of cases, name, age, gender, which limbs where affected, mortality. It appears as though one-third of the individuals who survive the disease will experience very similar symptoms some thirty or forty years later. It’s as if the disease has a memory of where it first struck. When did you begin to limp again, Sévère?’
‘About a year ago.’
‘Did it come on gradually?
‘Yes. First the prickling only, and later it seemed my knee was less…stable.’
‘Hum… Let me look at your hip and your spine.’
Johnston took his time examining Sévère. He commented on the bruised ribs, asked a few questions as to his history of diseases and injuries, his eating habits, how much he sat and how much he walked, if he did any exercises. But mostly, Johnston was silently examining his patient’s muscles and bones.
When he was satisfied, he straightened, pulled a blanket back up and said, ‘It appears you are suffering from recurring infant paralysis. In fact, this is the only forthcoming explanation for your symptoms. Your muscles are losing their ability to stabilise the knee joint. The ankle and hip will probably be affected next, but I can’t tell when. Another injury such as the one you’ve incurred today will become more and more likely without a proper walking aid. I’ll get you a fitted brace so your knee can heal. You’ll have to wear it for two to four weeks, together with a crutch.’
Sévère felt his eyes burn and his throat ache. He squinted at a tree outside the window, and fought for self-control.
‘I meant to ask you something,’ Johnston continued. ‘I was rather hoping you might wish to consult me on all your future cases. I appreciate a man with a clear mind and sharp eyes. I’ve heard your predecessor was rather…dull. He and Baxter must have been a good fit.’
Despite the throbbing in his knee, Sévère couldn’t help but grin. ‘Johnston, you called me “lad” and I failed to object, now you want to exploit my weakness even further and sneak yourself into all my cases?’
‘Precisely.’
‘To be honest, I desperately need a surgeon with your skills.’
Johnston smiled broadly. His eyes twinkled. ‘I knew that, lad. We are rare specimens, aren’t we? Tell me, why are you interested in medicine?’
‘Because I firmly believe that a coroner should be an expert in both, medicine and law. Unfortunately, neither is required to be called into office.’
‘Is it not?’
‘The only requirement is that the man must own property.’
‘That is all?’
‘That is all.’
‘Hum. Why am I not surprised?’ Johnston scratched the nape of his neck, and grew sober. ‘One of our staff manufactures the most comfortable crutches. He’ll need about a week after he takes your measurements. You’ll certainly be needing a customised crutch in the future, even after your knee has healed. I would recommend using it at home even when you think you don’t need it. It prevents you from tiring your leg too much. You might think you are doing fine with your cane, but the more you exhaust that leg, the faster the paralysis progresses. I don’t like to say this, but… Sévère, in the best case, you’ll need a crutch permanently in ten, fifteen years. In the worst case, you’ll be sitting in a chair by next winter. I can’t tell you what will happen, or when. No one can. But do me a favour and rest your leg when it tires you. You will make matters worse if you put too much strain on it. There will be pain in your joints most likely. Do you smoke opium?’
Sévère shook his head.
‘You’ll probably do so, soon. Let me know when your leg starts growing weaker. Invite me for a drop of tea in a week or two, and I will bring that fine crutch along. Use it only at home for now if you don’t want to be seen with it. Exercise your torso well, because your body and your heart need to stay healthy, but avoid running at all costs. Avoid climbing stairs wherever possible. I’m sorry, lad. I wish I could be of more help.’
❧
Sévère stared down at his newly fitted brace. Four days after the injury and the pain in his knee had lost its knifelike quality. Now, a throbbing stretched from shin to thigh. He stared until he felt an itch in his eyes. This was the third time in his life he felt utterly devastated. He’d spent years conquering the deficiencies left by the disease. He learnt to walk twice, and now had to watch this ability gradually leave him again.
He wondered if he should bury himself in drink.
‘You would walk even more awkwardly, lad,’ he muttered to himself. Then he unbuttoned his waistcoat and his shirt, shed both garments, grabbed his temporary crutch, and hobbled to the doorway that separated his bedroom from his library. He balanced on his right leg, dropped the crutch and reached up, curled his fingers around a newly-installed metal bar and pulled himself up.
He didn’t count the number of pull-ups. He pushed beyond the pain to free his fury. Growling, he worked until sweat rolled down his face and chest, then he dropped to the floor, and punched the doorframe.
He watched the beads of blood crawl in between his fingers. A knock disturbed him.
‘Mr Sévère, sir? I heard a noise. Are you quite all right?’
‘Yes, thank you, Netty. Would you please bring me water to wash?’
‘Of course, sir.’
He listened to the tapping of her feet on the rug, fading down the stairs toward the scullery.
A drop of sweat hit his palm. He blinked down at it; the reflection of the oil lamp painted it golden.
A vibration crept through his body, and Sévère found himself wishing to see Mary lift her face to the falling snow once more, looking as if she were in love with everything.
‘I’ll b
e damned,’ he growled.
❧
Samuel Stripling left Covent Garden with empty hands. Or an empty notepad, so to speak.
He hailed a hansom and climbed aboard. ‘London is a madhouse,’ he muttered to himself as the driver tried to manoeuvre his horse through the dense and chaotic traffic. Twenty minutes later, he arrived at the Cannon Street offices.
‘Stripling,’ Sévère called out. ‘The Posgate case will be heard on February 28. That’s in a little more than a month.’
Stripling entered the office, and sat down on an armchair opposite his employer. ‘We don’t have anything more to add to that case. The man was about the centre of the road—’
‘I know my cases, Stripling. Thank you. I meant to ask you if you had spoken with the magistrate of Division H. He was to have paid our fees by January 2, and he still hasn’t done so. A large part of the last quarter’s budget was spent on this case. Posgate is to be tried for felonious killing. I fear that the magistrate might believe the verdict of an accidental death, which was returned by our jury a few weeks ago, justifies his disallowing of our fees. Yet again! I want this to be handled before Posgate’s acquittal. So. Did you speak to the magistrate?’
‘Yes, I did.’ Stripling picked at his fingernails.
‘And what did he say?’ Sévère, trying to keep the edge from his voice, sounded unnaturally soft.
‘He said that Home Office is delaying payment of Division H allowances and that he must wait for this money to arrive, else he would be paying you from his own pocket.’
‘For Christ’s sake!’ Sévère’s fist hit the desk. The fountain pen jumped from its holder. ‘I don’t give a damn about Division H’s budget problems, or where the magistrate privately spends his money! How in all that is holy am I to do my work?’
Stripling grumbled agreement.
That noise irritated Sévère even more. ‘And what was your reply?’
‘Um…I bade him a good day.’
‘As expected.’ Sévère took a deep breath, poured himself a coffee without offering a cup to Stripling. ‘How was Covent Garden?’
‘I… Mr Sévère, there is no man who fits the description. No one sold seven apple trees to Mr Bunting. I believe we are wasting our time on this case.’
Sévère swallowed all further comments on the matter. All he said was, ‘Write your report. I want it in an hour.’
‘An hour?’
Sévère leant back and regarded the man sharply. ‘Are you aware that the only reason you are still employed is that you excel at paperwork?’
He watched a spectrum of colours flicker across Stripling’s face: red, white, and red again. The nervous darting of his eyes, the shuffling of his feet. Sévère had to admit to himself that he was, in fact, already damned.
Cigar smoke curled up toward the ceiling. Sévère thought of his health that was once again betraying him, the poor intelligence of his officer that seemed to worsen the longer he kept the man employed, and the string of financial problems the magistrate deemed it necessary to create. The situation was unacceptable.
He pulled out a pen and drafted a letter to the Justices advising them that the magistrate was to be sued for unpaid fees due the coroner. As soon as he’d put his seal to the envelope, he felt better.
There was little he could do about his leg, but he would have to replace Stripling. He needed an assistant with wits and balls.
Balls?
He almost choked on the thought.
❧
“Need your opinion on recent developments in our case. Come to my practice when convenient. G.S.”
She re-read the telegram but it puzzled her still. Our case. She shook her head and gazed out the window. Drizzle hit the glass and ran down in small rivulets. The day was a foggy yellow. A while ago, the church bells had struck ten. She grabbed her coat, and told Bobbie that she was off for an early lunch.
A stranger answered her knock and offered to take her umbrella and coat. She thanked him and walked through the hall, stopping in front of a door that stood ajar. There he sat, behind a large desk, stacks of paper piling up on either side of him, a cloud of smoke rising from a cigar that sat on an ashtray.
When he lifted his head to find her framed in the doorway, his eyes lit up. For a moment she wondered why he would be happy to see her. But the expression disappeared in a heartbeat. Perhaps a trick of the light.
She took a step forward. ‘Hello, Sévère.’
‘Miss Mary, come in and have a seat. Tea or coffee?’
She took off her gloves and her bonnet, and sat. ‘Coffee, please. No milk, no sugar.’
He frowned, stood, and bent forward. ‘This scar is new.’ His arm stretched over the desk, a finger touched the small scar at her eyebrow. She pulled back.
‘How did that happen?’
She opened her mouth, then shut it. ‘You need my opinion on a case. How can I help you?’
He sat back down and scanned her face. ‘How did that happen, Miss Mary?’
‘Are you still investigating who dumped Alexander Easy into the Thames?’
‘Yes, I am. In my spare time. But as long as I’m not allowed to search a certain brothel for evidence, I can’t get anywhere with my conclusions. Something, however, tells me that such a visit would result in arse pain.’
She threw back her head and laughed. When she looked at him again, he asked softly, ‘How did this happen, Miss Mary?’
‘Occupational hazard. I don’t wish to talk about it.’
His expression darkened. He nodded once and said, ‘I have to apologise. I forgot to wish you a Merry Christmas when we parted.’
‘You’ve thought about this for weeks? Do Jews celebrate Christmas?’
‘I’m neither a Jew nor do I see any reason to celebrate Christmas.’ He pushed a folder toward her. ‘The case notes. I will summarise them for you in a moment.’ He rose, grabbed his crutch, and limped slowly to the door, called for fresh coffee, and returned to her side. ‘Shall we sit by the fire?’
She nodded, and they relocated.
‘What happened to your leg?’ she asked.
‘A small injury to the knee. It looks much worse than it is.’
She tipped her head at him. ‘You could have said instead that you don’t wish to talk about it.’
‘I could have.’ He picked at the armrest and flicked a speck of lint toward the fireplace. ‘It is an automatic response. You are correct, I don’t wish to talk about it.’
He looked into the flames, lost for words.
‘The summary of the case,’ she said softly.
‘Ah, yes. Thank you. The short version is this: There’s no suspect. I don’t have the faintest idea who could have done it, nor where I could find additional clues. The long version… Well.’ He inhaled, and began to recount the past five weeks of investigations. The coffee was brought in and they emptied their first cup, and then a second. Mary remained silent until Sévère signalled the end of his speech.
Mary wiped a drop of coffee from her upper lip and slowly shook her head. ‘You were hoping I would see something you don’t? I am very sorry, but I can’t help you. There’s nothing I can possibly add.’
‘Read the case notes. Return them to me in a few days. If you have questions, send a telegram or find me here. I will pay you your usual fee.’
She gazed at the folder, felt across its edges with her fingertips, and said, ‘You are a queer man, Sévère.’
❧
Mary placed the case notes on her bed and opened the folder. She read for hours, but all clues led to a dead end. The nine newborns must have been buried in, or near, Redhill — the soil indicated as much. But there was no suspect, nothing that pointed from the Redhill-type Fuller’s Earth found in one of the skulls to a person, an event, or a specific location in Redhill. These nine children seemed to have never existed. As did the vendor who had sold the trees to Mr Bunting at Covent Garden, in summer the previous year.
All the men who had regu
larly purchased plants from MacDoughall to sell off elsewhere had been located, and none of them could recall selling seven apple tree saplings to an elderly man at Covent Garden. But then… If the vendor had been the murderer or an accomplice, he would certainly not have volunteered this information…
There was no other plant nursery in the area between Redhill and Limpsfield. No vendor had sold MacDoughall’s apple trees to someone who in turn had sold them at Covent Garden.
Woburn Sands was a hamlet of hobby gardeners with two semi-professional nurseries, neither of which exported their plants to London. Mrs Fouler had been the prime suspect for two days, but the whole of Bedfordshire lacked a shallow cledge, and its Fuller’s Earth deposits were located at below twenty-five yards depth — too deep for someone with a shovel and the need to hide a corpse quickly. Besides, the findings of Johnston and Pouch showed that the six bodies buried in Mrs Fouler’s backyard had not suffered violent deaths, and they had nothing in common with the nine skeletons found in seven flowerpots.
Mary sighed. The church bells struck six in the evening. She had to do her homework. She rose, hid the notes under her bed, and dressed in a deep burgundy dress.
‘Rose?’ she called down the stairs.
The girl stuck her nose around the corner, and showed a toothy smile. ‘Bite to eat?’
‘I’m perishing.’
While she ate, she opened a fairly new volume of “Anatomy. Descriptive and Surgical,” by Gray and Carter. Simon had lent it to her months ago. She wondered which section she should choose for tonight. Something complex, perhaps? Smiling, she turned the pages to “Muscles and Fasciae of the Foot.”
After she had eaten, she washed her mouth, face, and feet, and settled on the armchair. The bells struck seven.
He would be early tonight, he’d written. His letter had contained a short poem he claimed to have penned. It was Whitman, though. She liked it anyway.