We pass through the black wrought-iron gates surrounding the Mutter and climb the stairs to the entrance. I swallow as father heaves the massive wood door open. It’s as if their towering architecture was designed for the Nephilim.
I give father a wry smile and exhale through my teeth. We pass behind the large marble staircase, into the top floor of a double-decker room.
The first floor is littered with glass cases in various states of repair while the ceiling is yawning open, allowing those on the second floor to peer down.
I stare over the edge and catch a flash of Arabella’s auburn hair and a young man’s stooped posture. I recognize Jeremy, my fellow antiquarian; the only man in the Mutter with whom I could possibly tolerate sharing a pint.
We walk slowly down the staircase and the sight gives me pause. It’s the strangest room I’ve ever seen.
Like Poe’s nightmares have materialized and then been neatly categorized for humankind’s education.
Wall to wall oddities, each more horrifying than the last. Brains, suspended in fluid, plaster molds of a pair of conjoined twins, fused at the torso.
Arabella completely ignores us. She lifts a skull from inside a box and holds it aloft, her eyes roving across it.
Jeremy hurries over, extending his hand. “Wonderful to see you again. Welcome aboard, Henry. So, they hired you for your ‘moulages’?”
Father is trying not to smile. I try not to pummel him.
The room is suddenly a blazing inferno. I force the fidget from my hands.
Arabella’s intense gaze fixates on us. “But I thought the European masters were very secretive?” she prompts. “That’s why we’ve had to ship all of our models in from abroad.”
When it becomes apparent I am mute, father answers for me. He gives me one more last-chance glance and rolls his eyes.
“They are. But…Holmes and I have contacts across Europe.”
Arabella nods. “Of course.” Then in a lower voice, “People who owe you favors.” She mumbles as she walks away, “The very reason I am here as well.”
In seconds, her focus is back on the skulls; placing one on a shelf and plucking another out of the box.
I set down my box and extract two wax figures surrounded by bell jars; the first of a child’s arm with smallpox, the other of a gangrenous lower leg.
Father checks his watch. “I’ll leave you to it then. See you this evening Henry. Don’t forget to prepare for your presentation,” father says.
Now I roll my eyes.
“What presentation?” Arabella is all eyes again. She spies the molds and hurries back over. Her inability to remain in one place for more than ten seconds is giving me vertigo.
“Dr. Stygian and I are giving a phrenology lecture tomorrow if you’d like to attend.”
“I have to be moving, too, or I’ll be Stygian-meat. I’ll be at the lecture. It sounds fascinating,” Jeremy interjects over his shoulder. He’s walking across the museum floor, into the adjoining room. He disappears as the door clicks shut.
Arabella scoffs, “Psuedo-science.”
She bends to stare at the molds. “May I?” She nods toward the specimens.
“Of course.”
Her dark blue eyes squint and scrutinize. After a moment she nods. “They’re quite good, Henry. Dr. Earnest chose well.”
She spins, heading back to her categorization.
I walk over to her pile of bones. She’s particularly lovely today without the frills, in trousers, black boots and a white shirt. They hug and accentuate her every curve. I swallow and avert my eyes, which dart to a glass case and a very long…colon.
I shrug. “I’m not sure I put much stock in phrenology either, but I did do the coursework, so figured I’d assist Stygian. It was before…we talked.”
About him. About his need to acquire you like some artifact.
She waves the words away without pulling her eyes from the skull.
“Quiz-time, genius. Pray, tell me, why do we have this skull?”
She’s asking me to identify abnormalities. A test.
I force myself to examine it, not her. I squint and rub my chin, considering.
A long jagged line puzzles across the forehead, cutting it in half. I estimate the age of the specimen by the size of the head.
“Persistent frontal sutures. They should’ve disappeared with the fontanelles as a younger child. It results in the egg-shaped skull.”
Her face lights up. “Very good. You may be after my job.”
She flips up another. “This one?”
This head is gruesome. Porous holes have eaten into the forehead, trickling down to distort the nasal area. “Syphilis damage.”
Arabella drops it and claps her hands. “You have studied.”
She manages to be condescending and charming. Just like her father.
I smile. Arabella’s reaction to science is like Priscilla’s reaction to a new gown.
“Did Stygian give you the tour?”
My teeth grit together. I can’t stop imagining him touching her hand, her back ... it’s more than I can stand.
Angered revulsion bubbles in my chest.
She’s staring, her lips pouty and perplexed. My grimace is reflected in the mirror behind her.
“Sorry.” I banish the thought. “No, I’ve not had a proper tour. Would you do me the honors, Miss Holmes?”
“Delighted, Mr. Watson.”
To my great happiness, her arm slides through mine. Attraction tingles up my spine and my collar’s suddenly three sizes too small.
I lose focus. She’s talking. I struggle to pay attention.
I thought four years away would lessen her hold.
She drops my arm and turns to stare. “Henry! Really, are you always so distractible?”
Only in your presence.
I hear father’s words regarding Arabella, and my feelings toward her, delivered on the day of my departure as she walked away.
“Some distance, Henry, and you will gain perspective. You are very young. I am sure this trip to France shall expand your horizons.”
I clear my throat.
“I’m sorry. I’ve much on my mind. I promise to be a better pupil. Continue.”
She sighs like I’m one of her charges.
I stare up at the loft above. The entire perimeter of the square is lined with cases and the smell of formaldehyde stifles the air.
“One of our duties is to venture out and secure the specimens when the calls arrive?”
She nods. “Yes. You, I, and Jeremy Montgomery.”
She walks ahead and halts in front of the first case. Several bits of brains float and bob in glass bell jars.
“The brains of murderers. This one killed all three of his wives. They dissected them—”
“To try to determine what constitutes a fiend?”
“Essentially.”
Skulls of various species sit in a row: orangutan, capuchin monkey, crocodiles, cats and dogs. “These need no explanation.”
I halt at a picture of a young woman I instantly recognize.
“Laura Dewey Bridgman. The first blind-deaf mute to learn to communicate.” A flash of memory skips through my head. “Didn’t you have a doll with the eyes poked out that you named Laura?”
She smiles. “I and every other small girl of my age. We were all inspired by her.”
Arabella gestures to a partially full case. My eye twitches.
Stillborns inhabit the glass jars, each suspended in their fluid filled coffin.
Arabella’s normally smooth face pinches. “Conjoined twins, tethered at the cranium.” She averts her eyes and gestures without looking. “Anencephaly—born with portions of the cranium and brain missing. Well, you can read them. They’re all labeled.” She walks away and very quietly adds, “By me.”
She turns to leave, headed back toward the comfort of her beloved bones.
My head whips toward a tumult on the sta
ircase.
Montgomery is taking the stairs two at a time in a gangly whirl of arms and legs. A man-sized spider.
“Arabella, a stillborn call has arrived.” He shoves a piece of paper into her hand. “Stygian says to make it a priority, and that only you should go. Sorry.”
Arabella stiffens, holding the paper in the tips of her fingers as if he’s handed her a serpent.
She presses her lips white and nods.
Montgomery hurries back up the steps, shooting me a salute. “See you at dinner, Henry.”
Arabella’s frozen, staring at the paper. It begins to rattle in her hand.
I hurry to her side and gently touch her arm. “What is it?”
She whirls, her mouth contorting with dread. “He knows I do not wish to acquire the stillborns. It’s the singular request I’ve placed in the year since I’ve been here. I stay later than the others and I’m more precise and I work harder. It’s never enough.”
Her eyes widen and fly to the case. Her shoulders shake as if stricken with palsy, her fingers splay against the glass.
“They—they affect me, Henry. Stygian does it to grind in the point. That I am a woman and do not belong here. That my feminine constitution is not compatible with science.”
I take her hand and fight the haze induced with touching her and extract the paper.
“I’ll do it, Bella.”
“No one ever called me that but you.” She squeezes her eyes tight, fidgeting with a baby-blue ribbon around her neck. She gives it a compulsive tug, and I glimpse a small silver key. She drops it and stares me full on.
“He will be cross.” She shrugs, “Like any other day. Henry… thank you. I will come, however. Stygian is perpetually searching for a cause to dismiss me. How might I repay you?”
I move across the room, shrugging on my coat. “Come to the phrenology lecture.”
She sighs. “Fine.”
###
Henry
The carriage rattles through the night. I glance at my pocket watch.
Bella is as silent as Laura Dewey-Brigman. She hasn’t uttered a word since we departed the Mutter.
I have seen this…stillness before, in Holmes. When in pursuit, his body could remain immobile for hours; a sure sign his mind performed mental acrobatics.
It was disturbing. One without knowledge of the Holmes family might’ve thought him, or her, catatonic.
Bella’s hands suddenly jerk to life, and absently stroke the black and white dog between us. He cocks his head to stare and whines.
Words fail me, too. What might I say to calm her? This horrendous deed must be done.
We arrive at the address, 22 Riddle Run Road.
Jameson, the museum coachman, opens the door, extending his hand to Arabella. His concerned, ancient eyes sweep across the sprawling brick home and then back to Bella’s face.
I suspect he’s accompanied her to past acquisitions.
Arabella steps out to stare at the building as resignation blackens her features.
She squares her shoulders. “Henry. I will do it. Just…wait in the carriage.”
I open my mouth to protest, but she’s halfway up the walk.
Newton, her dog, follows, his tail tucked between his legs. She traverses the walk, backlit against the yellow light. The dog halts, sitting to wait, without a word from her.
Fear for her closes my throat. A primal need to protect her.
“Blast. I cannot sit in this infernal carriage.”
I scramble out to wait beside the dog.
She hesitates, fingers tracing the knocker; a horrible gargoyle. Her shaking fist raps on the door.
The tremors intensify; up her arm, through her shoulders, till her whole body quivers.
I hurry to her side and glance down, expecting her fury.
She meets my eyes, and I don’t see anger but instead, a gratefulness.
I raise my fist and knock hard on the wood. Mid-rap, the door opens and a squat, red-faced man appears, dabbing his forehead with a handkerchief.
The man extends a fat hand, pumping mine unconsciously. A large round ring, sporting an R- bumps against my finger.
A feminine wail pierces the hall, like a woman being murdered. Hair stands to attention all over my body.
I nod. “Sir. We received the call to come to collect the child.”
“Children, actually. Thank you. My wife is upstairs. Nasty business, this. Triplets. Two dead, one still on the way, God willing.”
He hurries up the stairs, and Arabella and I follow.
Her shoulders hitch as she fights to maintain her breathing, but her face is chiseled from stone.
“In here.” He motions into a room adjacent to the birthing room.
We step inside and my mind reviles in horror.
Blood, so much blood.
Stained white sheets pile on the floor, blood-filled basins and forceps litter the table. I jam my eyes shut to reorient myself and feel my nostrils flare.
The salty-copper smell saturates the air and fills my mouth. The sanguine smell of death.
Arabella curtsies to the midwife, bowing her head in reverence for the dead. “Madame Cutler? We are here for the babies.”
The gray-haired midwife sighs, pressing her chalky lips tight. She wipes her brow with her blood-stained fingers and it leaves a macabre streak. “We tried, Miss Holmes. But sometimes—”
Arabella holds up her hand. “I know. I know you’ve done your best. You always do.”
A feminine howl erupts from behind the closed door. Bella and I start at the sound. “There is still one child on the way?” I prompt.
“Yes.”
A small housekeeper bustles around, gathering the bloody sheets, her face is ashen as she mumbles. “I say the mistress is better off. She looked at the moon, she did. If this baby lives it will be at best a sleepwalker, and worst, a lunatic.”
I harrumph. “Absurd. Might I be of assistance, Midwife Cutler, is it?”
“That’s quite enough, Fanny.” Madame Cutler rolls her eyes, lowering her voice. “She’s new, and we’re down two maids. Ignore whatever comes out of her mouth.”
Another wail. But this one is made of melancholy and seeps around the door, as if the woman’s hope is fading.
“What do you know of birthing?” The midwife’s face is skeptical. “The town doctor is indisposed at present. An how old are you, boy?”
“Only a score and three, I’m afraid. However, my father is a doctor and insisted I be instructed on as many areas of medicine he could squeeze into my school breaks. I am by no means a physician, but have seen my fair share of births.”
“Against my will,” I add, low enough so only Bella may hear.
The midwife turns, conferring with the maid.
Arabella whispers, “Liar. You are not yet twenty and three.”
“Only off by weeks.” I raise an eyebrow. “You aren’t helping.”
Another wail and the midwife whirls. “Fine. I need any help I can get.”
Arabella’s eyebrows have disappeared beneath her fringe and she’s shaking all over.
I turn around to stare at her. “You don’t have to come in.”
She quickly shakes her head. “No. I’m coming.”
We follow the matron into the room. Bella leans against the wall, her face a blank, white slate.
The midwife steps quickly back into position between the mother’s legs and I slip in beside her.
“The baby is crowning.” A brown tuft of wet hair appears.
“Ahh! Please, please Mrs. Cutler, save this one.” The mistress of the house is gaunt and haggard; her pale complexion proclaims her time is fading.
“Shush now, Missy. Save yer strength.”
A contraction rocks the protruding belly but the head doesn’t budge.
“You see?”
My eyes drift up the woman’s unnaturally small waist; undoubtedly corseted till her
innards were hour-glassed.
“Like a camel through the eye of a needle.” I sift through my deliveries with father. A spark of hope lights and my mind fans the flame. “Might you have any chloroform?”
“Aye. Just a spot left. Susie, attend her.” The nurse bustles to the woman’s head as the pungent smell floats down to the two of us.
“Do you have scissors?”
“Yes.”
“Clean them.”
“How?”
“Scorch them over the flames.” I gesture to the roaring fire. “Hurry, please. We haven’t much time.”
The nurse returns and I feel the still-warm metal slide into my palm.
“What are you doing?” The midwife is horrified.
“I am going to make an incision…to widen the birth canal. I’ve seen my father do it on several occasions. And I’ve…done it once.”
“Let him try! Look at her!” Arabella’s normally-low voice is high with fear.
The woman’s respirations are slowing. Her chest barely rising and falling. “She’s lost a good deal of blood.”
The midwife notices, too. We will lose the mother as well.
“Alright. Go on then.”
I slide the scissors to her perineum. The next few moments are like an automobile ride, with time streaming too-fast, leaving me slightly dizzy.
The hard muted click of metal through soft flesh.
A wail; a rock-hard contraction. “Bear down Missy! Push with everything ye got!”
The lodged head depresses into the fleshy crease I’ve created, sliding beneath her pubic bone.
A gush of amniotic fluid and blood and soft-baby-skin slide into my arms. A boy.
I smile so wide it’s painful.
Hands slide around him as the nurse whisks him away.
‘Thwack’. The nurse smacks his tiny bottom.
I hold my breath, thinking of the stained sheets in the adjoining vestibule. Please let him live, please let him breathe.
A lamb-like cry fills the air, breathing life back into the room.
My heart slows and I feel the relief flooding my arms and legs, weighting them. I move alongside the midwife, showing her where and how to stitch up my incision.
I turn to Bella. She clears her throat. “Well, well done Mr. Watson.”
I nod.
The midwife calls over her shoulder, still tending to the afterbirth. “That was quite a trick, Mr. Watson. I will be in touch. I want to hear all your father has taught you. It is a bleedin shame you aren’t deliverin’ babies. The…poor lambs are in the adjoining room.”
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