Broken Meats: A Harry Stubbs Adventure

by Hambling, David

  “A most curious event,” said Yang. “The manifestation was unusual.”

  “Was it… real?”

  Yang laughed sharply. “Real and unreal, dark and light—everything is dualism for you! Do you forget the pattern so quickly?”

  “The manifestation—was it dangerous?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Did I do the right thing, pulling your hands apart from Howard's?”

  “Who can say? Right and wrong is more dualism… now, please, which turning here?”

  We had an appointment in Upper Norwood Library. It was one of the more compact sort of Victorian libraries and one that I had made use of on occasion. The library was doing its usual quiet trade. A scattering of people browsed the shelves while the reading tables were fully occupied—some pensioners but also several younger men hunched over the Jobs Vacant sections of the library newspapers.

  Although I did not know whom we were meeting, Yang had again decided that I should come along—as though he wished me to be seen with him.

  Yang consulted a note and led the way to the last alcove on the left, where a bearded man was absorbed in his studies at a round table, open books piled up around him. He was an odd individual, his beard long and ragged and his shoulder-length hair tied back in bohemian style. He had no jacket, just a colourless linen shirt a size too large for him with a rag of a tie and reading glasses mended with copper wire. He looked the sort of man who was too busy with higher things to take any trouble over his appearance and undid the work of any wife or valet who tried to set him straight.

  He was looking from one to book to another, lost in his work. I coughed politely. And he looked up.

  “Gentlemen, gentlemen!” he said at once, standing up and offering his hand. “Delighted to see you. My name is Powell.”

  Yang stood with his hands behind his back and nodded slightly. I made up for the deficiency and shook hands, introducing both of us.

  “Make yourselves comfortable,” said Powell, pulling out two chairs. “My library is your library. It’s a pleasure to meet other students of Roslyn D'Onston. “

  “As students, we are novices,” said Yang, suddenly humble. He took out a notebook and a silver fountain pen. “We are honoured that you interrupt your work for a few minutes to share your knowledge with us. Please permit me to record your words.”

  “The honour is all mine,” Powell beamed, and I saw he was missing a tooth.

  “All aspects of Roslyn D’Onston are fascinating,” said Yang. “But my purpose today is in what occult powers he claimed to possess and who his teacher was.”

  “So I gather—a most unusual interest!” Powell unfolded a grubby sheet of paper. “To start at the beginning… as a young man, he travelled to Paris in the 1860s to study medicine. He became acquainted with young Edward Lytton, son of Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton. When he showed an interest in the occult arts, he was introduced to the older gentleman, who initiated him into the Hermetic Mysteries.”

  “Bulwer-Lytton the famous novelist?” I said, astonished to hear the name again.

  “The same,” added Powell. “Properly, Lord Lytton, of course. Known to the public for his works of fiction but also a magist of considerable reputation. The account of magic in some of his works is correct—have you read Zanoni?”

  “Please, Mr Powell,” said Yang. “Tell us more of D’Onston. But you call him Stephenson?”

  “His real name was Robert D’Onston Stephenson, but he went more often by Roslyn D’Onston,” said Powell. “I use that name to avoid confusion with Robert Louis Stephenson.”

  “Another popular author—The Case of Jekyll and Hyde,” I supplied.

  “D’Onston studied medicine in Paris and chemistry in Hamburg, while there he carried out experiments of a psychical nature and dabbled in hypnotism. He served as a doctor with Garibaldi in 1860 and sought out witches in Italy; in West Africa he had a sort of apprenticeship with a witch doctor. After that, would you believe, he had a post with the Customs in Hull. That went sour when he was shot… so he went to India to study the occult.”

  Yang was busy taking notes. I was fascinated by the neatly composed Chinese characters flowing from his pen and forming columns of miniature hieroglyphs.

  “He returned to London and took up with the Theosophists. He formed a romantic attachment with Mabel Collins, secretary of the Theosophists, Madame Blavatsky’s assistant. That was when he was in Norwood, of course.” Powell gave me a significant look.

  “At this time, he wrote a number of articles for Lucifer, the Theosophy journal, under the pen name Tautridelta.” Powell displayed a cheap-looking magazine. “These were chiefly about Black Magic, a subject on which he was recognised as a leading expert.”

  “Do you know what powers he claimed to possess?” Yang asked.

  “I started to compile a list for you,” said Powell. “Some of them are just street tricks. There’s levitation—rising into the air—and being thrust through with a metal sword without being harmed, which he got from a fakir. But then there's this—he forced a witch in Sicily to give him the secret of a green ointment which, applied to the nerves above the eyes, gave the power of the fatal glance. He said he could kill cats and dogs with one look!”

  “Really?” I said.

  “That’s what he said,” said Powell with a laugh. “I might take that with a pinch of salt. He wasn’t a modest chap, and he liked stories. D’Onston said that in Germany, he was able to swap minds with a fellow student. While he was in the other man’s body, he went out and made love to his fiancé.”

  “Indeed,” said Yang.

  Powell stopped suddenly. I turned to follow his look. Behind me, a woman in a plain brown dress was going down the shelves, looking for a particular author. She took out a book, examined it, replaced it again, and selected another. Powell waited for her to go before continuing.

  “In Africa, he was apprenticed to a sorceress called Sube,” said Powell. “He claimed she was the original for Rider Haggard's She.”

  “That's another popular novel,” I added for Yang’s benefit.

  “Sube could kill a man at four hundred paces, make plants grow in minutes and transform men into half-bestial creatures for pagan orgies.” He was leafing through a book, finding a marked passage. “And more surprising yet, listen to this:

  “‘But the most terrible example of her power, to my mind, was in the transformation of the sexes. One day, being offended with a chief, who sought in vain to pacify her, she said to him, ‘I will degrade you, and you shall become a woman!’ Placing her hands upon him while he stood powerless as though turned to stone—his eyeballs staring in horror—she commenced her manipulations.’”

  Powell paused for effect. He enjoyed having an audience.

  “‘Beginning with his face, she rubbed away every vestige of beard and moustache. The prominent cheekbones fell in, and the smooth, rounded face of a woman became apparent. Next, the powerful biceps and triceps were rubbed down, and the lank lean arm of the African woman appeared. Next, seizing hold of his vast pectoral muscles, she began a different process, pinching up and pulling them out until there were shortly visible, well-developed mammae. And so she proceeded, from head to foot, until, in less than ten minutes, every vestige of manhood had disappeared, and there stood before us a hulking, clumsy, knock-kneed woman.’”

  “Indeed,” said Yang. He had stopped taking notes.

  While Powell was talking, I happened to look down at his shoes. The soles were secured to the uppers with lengths of twine, and they were battered and scuffed far beyond the ordinary degree. Powell was not simply an impoverished scholar who paid little attention to his appearance; he was an actual tramp. When I sniffed, I could detect the smell of the gutter common to all men of that type.

  Powell was explaining to Yang how D’Onston could project scenes of history in the air by means of the fourth dimension and how this was a fact of science as well as scripture. For all his rough appearance, he spoke like a scholar.
You could tell he had not always been the man we saw here. I believe Powell had been a respectable man once, a dry-goods wholesaler or some such. He had read an article about Jack the Ripper and then a book; it had become a hobby and then an obsession. The rest of his life had dropped away. Just from looking at him, you knew he did not have a home, a family, or a steady occupation anymore. All he had was this obsession, and it was meat and drink and family to him. This library had become his whole world. No wonder he was happy to admit others who shared the same interest.

  I had an awful premonition of my own future. How far astray would I go from the broad, high road of normal life?

  “But the blackest magic of all was that of Jack the Ripper.” Powell proudly placed in front of me a piece clipped from the Pall Mall Gazette: “The Whitechapel Demon's Nationality: and Why He Committed the Murder” by “One Who Thinks He Knows.”

  Neither Yang nor I spoke, and Powell took this as licence to proceed, warming to his theme and speaking faster.

  “D’Onston wrote this article and several others like it. He was the first to note that the murders were committed precise distances apart in a particular alignment. The murders were not committed by a homicidal maniac but by a perfectly sane and rational man: a magician following a recipe laid down by Eliphas Levi for raising the powers of Hell which required certain parts from a number of whores.”

  “Mass murder is not the act of a sane and rational man,” I protested.

  “It is when that man believes that he is on a higher plane, above good and evil,” Powell countered. “Like artists and scientists, magicians don't care about the petty concerns that bother the rest of us. Humans are insects to them.”

  “You believe that D’Onston knew about Jack the Ripper?” said Yang.

  Powell leaned forward, his voice dropping to a low, rapid murmur. “Yes, yes—look at the evidence! The timing, just after he had access to the Theosophist’s library. D’Onston was at a hospital in Whitechapel when each of the murders was committed. He showed his friends how it was done without getting bloodied! He tried to persuade others that a Dr Davies—who didn’t even exist!—was responsible. He wrote to the papers and persuaded another man to try and claim a reward from the police, giving him misleading clues… he was everywhere inside the investigation! They arrested him, but they couldn’t make it stick—”

  “Indeed, but what happened afterwards?” Yang asked, interrupting Powell’s flow.

  Powell shrugged. “There was an odd interlude when he set up a business with Mabel Collins in Baker Street selling a rejuvenating cream. Made from a secret formula! But… he was disillusioned with the occult after that. He started following Victoria Woodhull, the evangelist, and spent his last years on an original translation of the New Testament from original Greek and Latin Christian manuscripts. He held on to the occult way of thinking though. His notes on Holy Communion… consuming flesh and blood and gaining eternal life… I suppose we all dote on mortality close to the end.”

  “He’s dead then,” I said.

  “Oh, yes. I can tell you for sure that Robert D'Onston Stephenson is dead. I have a copy somewhere here of the death certificate. ‘Congestive heart failure’ in 1912. A pity. I would like to ask him a few questions!”

  Yang leaned forward in his chair. “You are certain he is dead?”

  “Quite certain. I visited the grave.”

  “Indeed.” Yang seemed to relax. “Roslyn D’Onston is dead.”

  The pause lengthened, and Powell looked from Yang to me.

  “In that case,” said Yang, “just one question remains. Could you kindly give us the address of the grave? It would be most interesting to visit it.”

  Powell looked puzzled then utterly horrified.

  “We merely wish…” I started, thinking Yang had somehow offended him with the question.

  Powell had turned completely ashen. His eyes rolled, and he made a dreadful sound like nothing I had ever heard. It was a long exhalation ending with a broken gurgle. It was, I now know, what is called a death rattle as the last air leaves a man’s lungs. When he fell backwards into his chair, Powell the tramp-scholar was quite dead. I knew it before Yang put two fingers to the man’s throat to feel for a pulse.

  The thought must have occurred to Yang and me at the same time. Powell had been looking at something behind us when he died. We stood as one and hurried back through the library. There was no fleeing figure for us to pursue down Westow Street. If there had been anyone whose glance had been death to Powell, they could have stepped quietly into one of the many alcoves in the library and pretended to browse the shelves. Yang and I looked down the aisles as we passed, but there were no familiar faces.

  By unspoken agreement, we left the library and continued without a word until we were back in the car. Yang took out his cigarette case, placed a cigarette between his lips, and as an afterthought, offered me one. I declined.

  “I may now explain some of my purpose here. In Shanghai, there used to be an occultist, once an associate of Roslyn D’Onston, who fled from Europe. He made himself an enemy of the Si Fan. It was necessary for him to be killed.”

  Yang drew smoke and released it contemplatively.

  “The occultist was suffocated to prevent his soul from escaping his body. His remains were placed inside a brass urn, which was sealed and kept under guard. One year later, nothing remained in the brass urn but maggots. The maggots were separated into seven portions and taken away to be fed to the fish of Seven Rivers.”

  I imagined the fish slipping away, disappearing like smoke into the endless water of the rivers.

  “In this way, we were assured that no trace was left of the body. No tomb, burial site—not even ashes. We did this because it is believed that a sorcerer may return if such precautions are not taken.”

  “A very thorough job,” I said. I could have asked what they did with the bones. Bone meal fed to the fish, I shouldn’t wonder

  “The dead man received a letter in cipher in Shanghai a few weeks ago. It was signed with the name of Roslyn D’Onston. The return address was Maycot in Norwood. We had believed D’Onston to be dead; it is necessary to discover whether this is the case.”

  “Could I enquire about the contents of the letter?”

  Yang gave me a sidelong look. I wondered if I was being impertinent, and perhaps it was not my place to ask, but he answered just the same.

  “He asked questions about a certain occult process, seeking confirmation for the correct element for a successful outcome—a question of blood. In addition… to curry favour with the sorcerer, D’Onston confessed to a crime against the Si Fan which was previously only suspected.”

  “The letter cannot really have been from D’Onston. It must have been one of the others. Powell was convinced D’Onston was dead, and he had taken pains to check the fact.”

  As I said it, though, I was uncomfortably aware that Powell’s own death looked much like the result of the evil eye that he attributed to D’Onston.

  Yang contemplated the cloud of smoke slowly turning on itself and dispersing. “Indeed.”

  Chapter Six: A Banquet and a Battle

  The next morning, Yang produced a slip with an address in the East End.

  “A Chinese establishment,” I said.

  “There are formalities to be observed,” said Yang. I was sufficiently attuned now to recognise his tone as one of resignation. He conveyed his meaning not so much by what he said as by what he did not say, if that makes any sense. “A visit is required to pay my respects to a family of importance.”

  He smoothed his goatee thoughtfully. “It would be beneficial if you were to accompany me. It will increase your experience of the life of the Chinese people. You may also have the opportunity to eat Chinese food.”

  “I don’t know if I’m up to a social engagement.” I was conscious of my appearance. I did not feel ready to meet any family of importance, English or Chinese. They would stare at my shabby suit and missing ear.


  Yang barked a laugh. “All foreigners are ugly giants with big noses and strange clothes to the Chinese. Do not be concerned. You will not be in any way different to other English to them.”

  Yang flicked an invisible speck off his lapel, straightened his cuffs, and rang the doorbell.

  A middle-aged Chinese woman in a plain blue smock ushered us in. She showed us through to a dim chamber decorated in the Oriental style with wooden screens worked with cranes and lotuses, bamboo matting, and low tables of dark wood.

  Three men, also Chinese, were waiting for us, sitting cross-legged on the floor. They were dressed in what I imagined to be traditional fashion—wearing silk smocks, their hair in long pigtails—and looked as grave as a row of carved Buddhas.

  Yang removed his hat and sat down in the same style; I did likewise with some small difficulty. A servant placed steaming cups of tea in front of each of us.

  “The tea is merely symbolic,” Yang murmured. “Do not drink it.”

  The three men started firing questions at Yang. Their tone seemed hostile at first, but perhaps the harsh, staccato nature of the language made it sound more so. Yang replied at some length in exactly the same tone. None of them touched their teacups, which presently stopped steaming.

  This went on for some time, and I was studying the pattern on the nearest screen, admiring the workmanship—it was a good cedarwood piece and crafted to the last degree of detail—when one of the men suddenly addressed me in English. “It is true you are assisting Yang here?”

  “As far as possible, yes.”

  “You saw a man die yesterday?”

  “I'm afraid I did.”

  “Will you describe the occasion?” he asked.

  I endeavoured to tell them how the unfortunate Powell had died, providing as much circumstantial detail as possible—even though they must only have been seeking to corroborate what Yang had already told them.